


Through it All

by fantasyseal



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, But in case that bothers you?, College Student AU, M/M, Not spoken about in that much detail, Post-Canon, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, character injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2017-01-22
Packaged: 2018-09-10 22:36:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8942110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fantasyseal/pseuds/fantasyseal
Summary: It's Kageyama's first day of university, and he finds someone he thought he'd lost forever.





	1. Tryouts

His roommate’s not there, when Kageyama moves in; there’s a bed close to the window with a pile of sheets thrown onto it and a mess of school supplies spilled everywhere. His roommate is, apparently, _incredibly_ messy (not that Kageyama’s exactly neat either). He’s finally hauled all his luggage up the stairs to his room when he spots a photo on his roommate’s desk that makes his breath catch, and he immediately forgets everything about not snooping in others’ possessions he’s ever been told and practically runs to investigate it.

It’s a high school volleyball team; a brown-haired boy with a gentle smile and a gray-haired boy with a wide grin on his face are crouching in the center, flashing V-signs at the camera. Then there’s a broad-shouldered boy with a fuzzy beard and a tiny, spiky-haired one in an orange uniform (contrasting everyone else’s black) who’s using the broad-shouldered one as a springboard. Next to him there’s a boy with his head shaved bald, laughing at the camera, and then another shaved-bald guy, one whose gray hair sticks into points, and one with a neatly combed haircut in the center.

Kageyama drags his eyes to the right side of the picture, knowing what he’ll see, and sure enough, there he is, face set in a perfectly neutral expression. There’s a boy with the fluffiest mess of orange hair Kageyama’s ever laid eyes on to his right, standing on tiptoe to give him bunny ears in the picture and smiling at the camera. An unreasonably tall blond boy stands to their right, trying and failing to look like he isn’t happy, and a green-haired boy who has no such problem, giving the camera a bright smile.

Behind the team stand two girls, a tiny blonde who looks like she’s been crying and a much taller girl with her hand on the smaller one’s shoulder. There’s two adults, too; one with his blond hair held back by a headband and one who’s obviously holding back tears for the photo. They’re all smiling.

Kageyama has the exact same picture in his luggage.

His roommate’s from Karasuno.

He _knows his roommate._

Kageyama feels better, suddenly; even if it’s Tsukishima (more likely one of the second-years; Tsukishima isn’t going to his university, as far as he knows, and also there is no way Tsukishima would display that photo), he _knows_ them, he knows how to deal with them.

This is incredibly reassuring, even if the sight of the orange-haired boy giving him bunny ears still stabs his heart out every time he sees it. Kageyama finishes unpacking and heads to the gym for tryouts. (What sadist put tryouts on _freshman move-in day,_ anyway?)

The sun is shining, when he steps out of the hall; it’s a perfect spring day, warm and breezy.

The kind of day that Hinata used to love; he’d drag Kageyama outside to eat lunch and then fall half-asleep in the grass. Kageyama woke him up when they had to go to class, and Hinata was always annoyed with him for letting him sleep and always made him promise to wake him up sooner next time, and Kageyama always ignored him, because _if you’re that tired, maybe you should just go to sleep earlier!_

What was he doing?

Oh, right. Tryouts.

He enters the student center, showing them his brand-new student ID and asking as politely as he can for directions to the volleyball club’s tryouts. He stops long enough to change into his shorts and kneepads, and then runs to the big gym, missing the flash of orange hair that should be overtaking him.

 _Stop that,_ he tells himself. _It’s just because your roommate has that photo, anyway. Focus on tryouts._

He pushes open the door to the gym to find it mostly empty. The net is set up already, and there’s someone standing on the other side.

Kageyama sees a wild orange ponytail that sticks out in tufts, and his heart stops.

The boy with the orange hair is staring down at the ball like it holds all the answers in the world; he throws it to the ceiling and runs after it, arms behind him, crouching and jumping and slamming the ball down on the other side.

His jump isn’t the height it had once been, he’s a few centimeters taller (he might actually be slightly taller than the Little Giant now), and his untamable hair has been combed into a ponytail, held back with a headband. Long hair and two years away can’t disguise the shout of “YES!” that echoes off the walls, though; Kageyama _knows_ that voice.

Kageyama responds the only way he knows how; he walks into the gym, into the boy’s line of vision, and shouts “ _What are you doing here?”_

He’s never been so happy to terrify someone; the boy freezes, a shudder going through him, and his brown eyes drop to find something, anything else to look at. “K-K-K-K-K…”

Every bit of restraint, patience, and self-control Kageyama has built up over the last two years seems to magically melt away at the sight of his former teammate. There’s a roaring anger in his ears, a need to pin down Hinata until he tells Kageyama _exactly_ where he’s been for the last two years and possibly punch him for not _saying anything._

“Kageyama,” Hinata gets out, finally, backing slowly up, keeping his eyes on Kageyama. “I…”

“ _Hinata,”_ Kageyama says. There’s so much he wants to ask. _Where did you go? Why did you leave us?_

_Why did you leave me?_

He must have his I’m-Going-To-Murder-Him look on his face, because Hinata still looks terrified. He backs up until his back is pressed to the gym wall, and he squeaks when he realizes he’s trapped.

 _You are a first-year university student,_ Kageyama tells himself. _You are capable of holding a civil conversation with your former teammate who ran off for no fucking reason and never so much as fucking texted to tell you he was fucking alive._

…Okay, no, he’s not. Tsukishima would laugh and say that this is why he was never so much as considered for captain, but he’s not. Kageyama storms across the room, gets as close to in Hinata’s face as he can given their difference in height (Hinata’s grown, but he has too, and Hinata still only comes up to his chin without his hair). “Where. Have. You. Been.”

“Yukigaoka High,” Hinata mumbles. “It’s the high school in my town. It’s where Izumi and Koji went.”

Kageyama is seriously going to punch him; his hands ball into fists and he sees Hinata flinch. “ _Why.”_

Hinata looks away, and Kageyama has _had it;_ he grabs Hinata’s collar, pleased to find that it’s easy as ever to lift him by his shirt.

“Hey!” Hinata protests, wriggling around. “Put me down!”

“No.”

“Tobio-chan, I know you’re upset, but that seems unnecessary.” Kageyama jumps and drops Hinata, wheeling around.

“Oikawa-san?”

“Hi,” Oikawa says, smiling and waving. “You’re going here too, Tobio-chan?”

That’s it, the universe has just decided he’s _never_ allowed to get over being an asshole in middle school and it’s going to torment him for the rest of his life.

And then he sees the captain label on Oikawa.

This just confirms his new theory. (At least this answers the ‘what sadist schedules tryouts on move-in day’ question.)

“Stop making that face, Tobio-chan,” Oikawa scolds. “Tryouts are in fifteen minutes!”

Kageyama, for lack of anything else he can do, turns back and scowls down at Hinata. “We’re not done discussing this.” More people are filtering in now; some Kageyama recognizes vaguely from following high school volleyball, but most he doesn’t. He does recognize Nekoma’s old #7, Inuoka; Hinata runs over to talk to him, or possibly just to hide from Kageyama.

“Chibi-chan’s back, hmm?” Oikawa asks, watching Hinata’s orange ponytail move around. “He got taller. What a pain.”

“We’re on the same team now,” Kageyama says, and Oikawa gets a mock-offended look on his face.

“That doesn’t make him less of a pain, Tobio-chan!”

Okay, as much as he disagrees with Oikawa, they agree on that. Hinata is a pain in his ass, even when Hinata isn’t here. And now that Hinata’s _back,_ he’s all Kageyama can think about. His head is buzzing with a thousand questions, and none of them have anything to do with volleyball.

_Why did you leave? Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t we see you at the tournaments? Why didn’t you come back? Did you think we didn’t want you? Did you think I didn’t want you? What happened to going to Nationals? What happened to being the next Little Giant? Why do you still have that picture? Do you have any idea how worried about you we were? What have you been doing for the last two years?_

Oikawa thumps his back. “Hang in there, Tobio-chan,” he says lightly, and heads off, calling “Come on, over here!” to get all the players in one place.

They do three-on-three to start, which is how Kageyama discovers that yes, Hinata can now jump serve. Consistently. His power is nowhere near Oikawa’s, but he has a talent for putting them in any tiny hole in the defense he can find. Kageyama takes revenge by firing _all_ his serves directly at Hinata, and finds out that Hinata is now significantly better at receiving.

“Tobio-chan, that’s mean,” Oikawa says, watching Hinata dive for one that Kageyama deliberately made short.

“He started it.” That earns him a derisive _how old are you_ look that Kageyama ignores, and Oikawa eventually wrestles down his smirk and claps his hands.

“All right,” he calls. “Hitting lines! Take your normal position. Those of you who haven’t played before, just pick a line and watch what everyone does in front of you. Who’s a setter?”

Kageyama raises his hand, and Oikawa claps. “Great! Tobio-chan, I’ll switch off with you.”

He can’t believe he nearly forgot how utterly _irritating_ Oikawa is, he thinks, jogging to the front. It starts off well; he sets tosses for all three lines, careful to sync with them and not set too fast, and then Hinata’s up.

Kageyama tries, he does. _Do a normal set. Do a normal set._

But then that flash of orange he hasn’t seen in years flies past him, albeit slower than it used to be, and their falling toss is leaving his hands before he quite knows what he’s doing.

Hinata misses it completely and crashes down. “Sorry…”

“My fault,” Kageyama calls. “Too fast. Sorry, Hinata.”

“My turn!” Oikawa singsongs. “Tobio-chan, pick a line.” Kageyama glares at him, but backs into the line on the far right.

The middle blocker line is longer than the wing spiker lines put together, so Kageyama gets a toss before Hinata, who’s bursting with impatience. It’s been _forever_ since he’s played with Oikawa, and he prays that Oikawa isn’t petty enough to make him miss on purpose.

Watch the set, run up, jump; Oikawa sends him a perfectly decent toss, and Kageyama hits a cross into the corner and lands, ducking under the net to get his ball.

“Start blocking once you spike,” Oikawa calls. “I want to see who can block, too.”

He did that on _purpose,_ Kageyama’s sure, but he waits on the other side of the net anyway. Hinata’s the next middle blocker in line; one of the liberos in the receiving line sends the ball back to Oikawa.

“Mine!” Hinata calls, raising his hand and starting his runup; Kageyama scoots over so he can try for a block.

“Chibi-chan,” Oikawa says, set already leaving his fingers.

It doesn’t bother Kageyama one bit to see Hinata hitting another setter’s toss.

Nope.

Not even if it’s Oikawa’s.

He jumps, surprised to find himself on a level with Hinata. His jump is _definitely_ lower than it used to be. Hinata scowls and bumps the ball, tipping it over Kageyama, and lands, ducking under to get his ball.

“Hey,” Kageyama says. “Use your jump, dumbass. Since when can you not out-jump me?”

He expects a snapped retort, maybe a _shut up, Bakageyama,_ but Hinata just looks at him and walks after his ball, jogging back to the middle spot to block without responding.

Oikawa’s watching through the narrowed eyes that spot every weakness in the opposition, and Kageyama wonders if he should remind Oikawa that they’re technically all on the same team now again.

“Left!” calls the one in front of the left-side wing spiker line, and Oikawa nods and sends it that way. Hinata and Kageyama both charge and jump for a block; too late, it’s slammed past them.

Hinata’s no faster than he is.

Which is still fast, but it’s not _fast,_ it’s not the _whoosh_ kind of fast that had catapulted them back into prominence their first year at Karasuno.

 _Stop it,_ Kageyama tells himself. _Tryouts. Volleyball. Focus._

He walks back to his line, hearing Hinata’s shoes squeak behind him as he returns to the middle blocker line, and lets Oikawa set the rest of the drill.

“Okay,” Oikawa says after what feels like a thousand more drills, clapping his hands to draw attention. “I’m going to email results, so everyone _check your student email,_ okay? Practice times will be in the email, too. See you next week!”

“Yeah!” they chorus; Oikawa catches Kageyama’s shirt on the way out.

“Tobio-chan,” he says. “Don’t push chibi-chan. He’ll tell you why he left when he’s ready.”

“You know, don’t you,” Kageyama says, staring at him. _Oikawa-san knows why Hinata left us._

_Hinata trusts Oikawa-san more than he trusts me._

Oikawa shrugs. “I was at a tournament to cheer on Seijoh. He was there to watch you idiots. I mean it, Tobio-chan; don’t be all demanding about it like you usually are.”

“Right,” Kageyama says, and jogs out, because playing with Oikawa is weird enough without Oikawa being _helpful._

 

Hinata’s in his room when he gets back, tapping out a message to someone on his phone. Kageyama knocks and pulls the door open, refusing to make eye contact when Hinata glances up and promptly lets out an all-time classic Hinata noise. “ _You’re_ my roommate?”

Kageyama’s completely unsurprised by this development (that picture kind of gave him away, come to think of it) and just shrugs. “Apparently.” He starts organizing his desk; math goes here, English goes here, his learn-about-other-cultures-that-he-has-exactly-no-interest-in course goes here, and the course Tsukishima calls Science for Idiots goes here. He sets down his laptop in the middle of what, it turns out, was a better configuration in his head, but it still beats Hinata’s _what’s organizing_ approach (his stuff is just all over the desk; there’s not even space for a laptop).

“Who are you talking to?” Kageyama asks; Hinata jumps.

“Kenma,” he says, glancing warily over like he thinks Kageyama might bite him.

Does _every setter they’ve ever played against_ still talk to Hinata? Kageyama turns away to hide the expression on his face, which he’s sure is the same _that’s my spiker back off_ look it usually is when other teams’ setters and Hinata’s ability to make friends with them come up in discussion.

 _Don’t push_ echoes in his head, and Kageyama opens his laptop to find roughly ten thousand messages from the chat the team used his first year to keep in touch.

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _happy move-in day!_

**_Tsukishima:_ ** _It isn’t move-in day until tomorrow._

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _it’s Kageyama’s_

**_Tanaka:_ ** _Did you meet your roommate yet?_

Kageyama looks over to Hinata. Should he tell them?

**_Kageyama:_ ** _yeah, I did._

**_Kageyama:_ ** _he’s from Karasuno. he’s on the basketball team._

The thought of Hinata trying to play basketball makes Kageyama snort; volleyball is one thing, but he’d _die_ in basketball.

**_GuardianDeity:_ ** _you lucky shit_

**_Ennoshita:_ ** _Nishinoya._

**_GuardianDeity:_ ** _i think that was warranted_

**_Kageyama:_ ** _Oikawa-san’s the volleyball captain_

**_GuardianDeity:_ ** _okay never mind_

**_Tanaka:_ ** _Gross_

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _you can learn to play with him, I’m sure_

**_Kageyama:_ ** _ugh_

“Who are you talking to?” Hinata asks, rolling on his bed to face Kageyama.

Kageyama remembers Nishinoya’s _I’m going to murder him_ rant when they’d realized Hinata wasn’t at Karasuno, Ennoshita’s quiet acceptance, the third-years’ offer to take a weekend off from their schools and come drag him back (Daichi in particular had been pissed off), Tanaka’s uncharacteristically quiet disappointment, Tsukishima’s _tch_ and smart comments (mostly variants on _if you love something, set it free, King_ ) and refusal to admit that he missed Hinata.

“No one,” he says, tilting his screen away.

“That’s not fair,” Hinata complains. “I told you…”

Kageyama ignores him and starts working on one of his neglected summer assignments. (He is _not_ avoiding Hinata; he has to get this done or his grade will suck from day one. At least this way he can argue that he tried.)

Hinata’s too-low jump and too-slow block are still bothering him. _He probably just hasn’t played in a while,_ Kageyama thinks. _He’s been slacking off. That’s all._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's holiday break, I survived all my exams, and I finally have time to breathe and write again :D (er, well, I've been writing, actually, but now I can do it without worrying about studying). This actually isn't finished (I got stuck), but since the beginning's hit the point where I make it worse with editing passes, I think it's time to post it. Thank you for reading! Next chapter next week sometime after Christmas!


	2. First Tournament

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Kageyama's former teammates come to cheer him on in his first-ever college volleyball match.

“Wake up,” Kageyama calls, throwing Hinata’s kneepads at him. “Practice time.”

One brown eye emerges from the pillow and _glares;_ since they’ve started sharing a room, Kageyama’s noticed that Hinata is not a morning person, in spite of being a ball of hyperactive energy most of the time. “The _sun_ isn’t even up yet.”

“No, but we are,” Kageyama responds, pulling on his shoes and folding his practice clothes into his backpack. “Hurry up.”

Hinata mutters something that sounds rude, but he rolls out of bed, rubbing his eyes. His hair is sticking out more than usual, he’s still in his pajamas, and he generally just looks like a mess.

“Aren’t those hot?” Kageyama asks, raising his eyebrows at Hinata’s long pajama pants. They look like old sweatpants, actually.

Hinata flushes. “They’re not that bad…” He trails off and grabs clothes out of his dresser, ducking into the bathroom they share with the adjacent room to change. Kageyama wonders when Hinata started being so modest; he’d never had a problem changing with the rest of them in the locker room.

Things change in two years, he tells himself. Hinata’s gotten shy. Big whoop. He’s already changed, so he checks that he has everything for his classes, putting away his laptop, and waits. Hinata comes out and sweeps his shoes and clothes and kneepads into his backpack, pulling his hair up into the stupid short ponytail that Kageyama still isn’t used to.

“About time,” Kageyama says; Hinata sticks his tongue out, and for once, their dynamic feels normal. Kageyama insults Hinata, Hinata hits back. That’s how it’s supposed to be.

They make it to practice with five minutes to spare and help set up the net (Hinata takes the poles, Kageyama ties it after they discover that Hinata still can’t reach the little hook that the string goes on).

 _Volleyball,_ Kageyama thinks. _Just think about volleyball. Don’t worry about Hinata._

Worrying about Hinata, unfortunately, is pretty tightly linked to volleyball; Oikawa’s put them on the same team, the B-team, in Hinata’s old position as a middle blocker. Kageyama tries to slow his tosses down in matches, but he just can’t sync back up with Hinata. His brain keeps insisting that Hinata’s faster than he is.

Hinata doesn’t say anything when he misses; his mouth tightens and he lands in a crouch.

 _Come on, you’re supposed to be a genius,_ Kageyama thinks. _You can sync with anyone. Even Hinata._ The next serve comes flying over; someone in the back picks it up.

“Nice receive,” Kageyama says automatically, already trying to figure out where to send it.

“Outside!” calls one of their new teammates, raising a hand.

Hinata doesn’t say anything, and Kageyama sets it, watching the wing spiker whose name he can’t remember jump and hit straight through the belated low block.

He sees Oikawa talking quietly to Hinata at the end of practice; Hinata’s nodding, and Kageyama guesses the talk is something along the lines of _be patient with Tobio-chan._

So he leaves, waving a goodbye in Oikawa’s general direction and calling a “See you next time” and ignoring Oikawa’s mock-surprised face.

Everything is fine.

He still hasn’t told their team from first year that Hinata is his roommate; they’re all busy with school, anyway, and most of them are balancing their schoolwork with volleyball. They don’t need to be distracted.

So when he discovers that they’re planning on coming to his first game, he panics.

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _hey Kageyama when’s your first tournament?_

**_Daichi:_ ** _If it’s on a weekend we can probably make it, at least us two_

**_Tsukishima:_ ** _I’m not flying to Tokyo just to watch the King play volleyball._

**_GuardianDeity:_ ** _i’m there anyway_

**_Kageyama:_ ** _you really don’t have to_

**_Kageyama:_ ** _I’m probably not even playing_

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _no, but we want to, so when is it?_

This is going to end badly.

Their first tournament is two weeks from now (it’s just a match against another local university, but apparently they have a rivalry; Oikawa’s eye twitches when he brings up the name); Kageyama tries as hard as he can to avoid it, but Suga finally just looks it up and pastes the event page (Facebook is a horrible invention, he decides) into the chat.

**_SugaSetter:_ ** _found it!_

_Fucking_ Sugawara Koushi.

He should probably warn Hinata.

Speaking of, here he is; he’s already changed out of his practice clothes and into normal ones, and he knocks on the door and comes in, waving. “Hey!”

“Uh,” Kageyama says. “Hinata?”

Hinata blinks at him. “What?”

“I know you don’t want to talk about why you left,” Kageyama starts, seeing Hinata’s face shut down. “And I’m okay with that.” _No I’m not._ “But, uh…”

“Sorry,” Hinata says quietly, interrupting him. “I know it’s been bothering you, I just…I can’t, yet.” He has that serious look he gets that’s either immensely comforting or immensely terrifying, depending on what side of the net he’s on.

“No,” Kageyama says, shaking his head, “it’s just, some of our old teammates are coming to watch us next weekend. Suga-san found that event page Oikawa-san made.”

“Oh.” Hinata sits on his bed, pulling his ponytail out and shaking out his hair (which somehow, despite being longer than Kenma’s and Asahi’s, still manages to stick up everywhere when it’s loose).

“I can’t stop them,” Kageyama says, watching him. “Oikawa-san might let you not play, though; we’re only on the B-team anyway.”

“No, it’s okay,” Hinata says, shaking his head. “I don’t wanna skip our first game. I’ll be fine. Thanks, though,” he adds with a small smile.

Kageyama remembers their collective anger and disappointment again; he’s less sure that Hinata will be fine, but he can’t _make_ Hinata skip the game, so he just nods and returns to his homework.

He said it was fine.

So it’s fine.

 

“Kageyama, quit staring at the bleachers,” Hinata scolds, poking his shoulder. “It’s almost time for warmups!”

Kageyama stops scanning the (surprisingly large) audience for their teammates and turns around to see Hinata scowling at him. “Sorry, I’m coming,” he says, jogging into line (in the back with the rest of the benched B-team).

“Sheesh,” Hinata huffs. “I think you’re more worried about Suga-san being here than I am…”

“They’re here,” Kageyama says, spotting them filing in together; Daichi, Suga, Asahi, and Nishinoya. The four of them take a seat in the front of the bleachers; Hinata _eep_ s and hides behind him. “Cut that out. I thought you weren’t worried.”

“I said I was _less_ worried,” Hinata whispers. “They’re really here?” The line keeps shuffling forward as more of their teammates hit their warmup spike.

“My turn,” Kageyama says, throwing Oikawa his ball and racing right. Oikawa sets it, and he hits it down as hard as he can, hoping to keep their old teammates’ attention on him and not the little orange spiker waiting to go.

“Good job, Tobio-chan,” Oikawa calls as Kageyama ducks under the net to retrieve the ball. “Last!”

He sees Hinata inhale, exhale, and throw his own ball to Oikawa, dashing to the left and jumping for it. He slams it down every bit as hard as Kageyama did, and Kageyama sees Suga’s mouth drop open. _Crap._

Maybe Suga’s just surprised that the short orange-haired spiker has that much power in his arms and thinks the resemblance to Hinata is a coincidence.

_Right, because Suga-san’s an idiot._

“Kageyama!” Hinata yells. “Come on, we have to line up!” Kageyama shakes his head to clear it out (it doesn’t work) and jogs over, taking his spot next to Hinata. Their jerseys are _still_ 9 and 10, mostly because Oikawa was the one who ordered them and Oikawa is an _asshole._

They bow, Oikawa shakes hands with the opposing team’s captain, and Hinata and Kageyama sit on the sideline and watch.

“Look who it is,” Kageyama murmurs, indicating the unnaturally tall guy on the opposition’s side.

“Huh?” Hinata looks. “Oh, it’s Lev!”

“Nekoma _is_ a Tokyo school,” Kageyama says, shrugging. “And this is where most of the best teams are. It’s not that surprising that some of them would stay in this area for university.”

“Nnnngh,” Hinata complains when Lev scores another point. “I wanna play…”

“Like you can out-jump him.” Kageyama doesn’t mean it insultingly; Lev is, almost literally, twice Hinata’s height, but Hinata still goes quiet and fixes his eyes on the game.

Hinata and Kageyama actually do get put in in the third set, Kageyama as a replacement so Oikawa can rest and Hinata as a pinch server. Kageyama snorts when he hears that. “ _You?”_

“Shut up.” Hinata bounces the ball and throws it, extending his arms behind him and jumping and slamming it at the opponents and smirking at Kageyama’s disbelieving look.

Yes, he’s seen Hinata doing jump serves in practice, but now, in competition, he’s even more ruthless; he hits it to a tiny hole in the opposition’s defense that Kageyama hadn’t even _seen_ , aiming for the front to force them to dive, and their libero makes a desperate last-second lunge that barely gets the ball back up.

“Lev,” the setter calls, tossing the ball; Lev grins and runs for it. The other two up front with Kageyama (he thinks one might be from Fukurodani, but he can’t remember his name, and he has absolutely no idea who the other one is) run to his side to help block.

“Ready…” the Fukurodani one calls. “Now!” They all crouch and jump, and _ow,_ Lev’s gotten ridiculously strong. They’d played in practice matches since first year, but either Lev had been holding back or he’s developed over the break, because he blasts straight through their block and right at Hinata.

Hinata looks pretty calm, though, Kageyama thinks, despite the ball whistling toward him at approximately a thousand miles an hour.

“Got it,” he calls, crouching and sending it back; Lev’s jaw drops on the other side of the net, and Kageyama fights down his proud-setter smirk. Hinata’s receives, at some point in the missing two years, have improved to the point where he’s nearly unrecognizable as the same person who used to consider receiving with his face a viable option.

It’s still not perfect, though; Hinata’s tracking it and yells “Short!”, and Kageyama has to run under it. _Who do I set to?_ He has the Fukurodani one who he can usually set to fairly reliably; the other one’s hit a bunch of points already, and he knows the other team is watching him.

And then there’s Hinata, who he hasn’t managed to set properly to since they met again. He’s watching, still, and then cuts left and runs forward, calling “Kageyamaaaa!”

His eyes flick over to Kageyama, and they have the same expression they’d had a thousand years ago in that training camp. _You aren’t going to toss to me, are you, but I’m going to jump anyway._

“Hinata!” Kageyama calls. _Set it slowly. Slowly. Normal quick; he can still do that, I’ve seen him do it with Oikawa-san._ The ball leaves his fingertips and flies to Hinata, and _yes,_ he smacks it straight through; the blockers are all still marking his other spikers.

 _Everyone always underestimates you,_ Kageyama thinks, hearing the sound of the ball hitting the court. Even Lev (who’s currently in the back, to be fair) hadn’t made a move to block him, and Lev _should_ know better.

Hinata lands and yells “YES!” with a laugh, throwing his fist in the air, and Lev looks _way_ too happy about the other team scoring a point, and Kageyama sees Oikawa wearing that particular my-plan-worked smirk on his face and resolves to accidentally serve a ball into his head later.

Still, he can toss to Hinata again, and Hinata’s grinning at him, and for now, that’s enough.

Even if they do get benched again two points and one Lev-blocking-Hinata-instead-of-the-actual-spiker set later.

They barely squeak into their 2-1 win; Hinata cheers along with everyone else, bouncing up and down like he always did in high school and pumping his fist. They bow and chorus “Thank you for the game”, and the other school files out, Lev waving at Hinata and Hinata waving happily back.

Kageyama notices the four former Karasuno members slipping out of the crowd in the bleachers. So much for sneaking Hinata away (though they’d just bring it up later anyway). He tugs Hinata’s sleeve. “Come on.”

“I don’t wanna,” Hinata mutters.

“I don’t think they care,” Kageyama says, folding his arms. “They saw you. We’re not getting out of here without talking to them.” Technically, he probably _could_ distract them long enough for Oikawa to get Hinata away, but that would require _working with Oikawa,_ and also they would just kill him later for trying.

Hinata follows him out; he’s never seen anyone, Hinata included, go from _ecstatically happy_ to _utterly despondent_ quite that fast. He’s hiding behind Kageyama again, too, the way he used to hide behind Tanaka _all the goddamn time._

“They’re less scary than me, aren’t they?” Kageyama asks, looking over his shoulder.

“Daichi-san is _way scarier than you,_ ” Hinata responds, glaring at him. “And you remember what Noya-san was like when Asahi-san quit the club…”

He can’t really argue with that.

There they are, waiting at the staircase (there is another one, but Suga’s positioned so that he has a clear line of sight to it); Hinata is still behind him, so Kageyama lifts his hand in a wave.

Daichi has the friendliest smile he’s ever had the misfortune to see on his former captain’s face; Nishinoya (who’s always been an open book) is scowling and tapping one foot. Suga has a perfectly neutral expression, and Asahi mostly just looks worried.

“Uh,” Kageyama says. “Thanks for coming.”

“Good job,” Suga says, smiling in what would be a completely nonthreatening way if it was anyone else. “You’ve really learned how to work with your spikers.”

Daichi nods. “And you saved that short receive nicely.”

They’re waiting for him to say something.

Because they know Kageyama knows, and he hasn’t told them, and they don’t know why, so they’re treading as lightly as they can while refusing to give him an out.

Kageyama looks behind him. “Come on, come out.”

Hinata ducks out behind him, scooting with an uncharacteristic shyness and looking down at his shoes.

“ _Hinata,”_ Suga says in the tone of voice one might use to say “There’s a bird making a nest out of the Vice-Principal’s wig”.

“Hi, Suga-san,” Hinata manages.

“Shouyou.” Nishinoya’s fists ball at his sides. “Where have you _been?_ ”

Hinata squeaks and goes back to hiding behind Kageyama. Kageyama can’t really blame him; Nishinoya is terrifying. He was terrifying first year when he was shouting about what a wimp Asahi was, and he’s terrifying now, fixing Hinata with a glare that rivals Kageyama’s.

“Your receives have really improved,” Daichi says quietly. “Especially that first one. That was a powerful spike.”

“Is that the best thing to talk about right now?” Nishinoya asks, staring at Daichi.

“It’s better than scaring him into running away,” Daichi says. “Besides, I’m sure he got all of this from Kageyama already.”

Hinata pokes his head out and nods, making his ponytail shake. “I, um,” he says. “Yukigaoka let me practice with them.”

“That rules out deciding you hate volleyball,” Suga murmurs, obviously lost in thought, and then when everyone looks at him, “What?”

Hinata goes bright red and doesn’t answer. “Anyway, um, I wanted to be useful, so I worked on my serving and receiving a whole bunch,” he says. “I didn’t do a lot of spiking practice third year.”

“You could have done that _at Karasuno,_ ” Nishinoya points out. If it’s possible for Hinata to turn redder, he does, shuffling his feet.

“Stop that, Noya,” Suga says, swatting him. “Don’t pick fights.”

“It’s good to see you,” Asahi says, smiling at Hinata. “We were all pretty worried when you didn’t come back. Takeda-sensei confirmed for us that you were at a different school, but he wouldn’t tell us anything else.”

He’s leaving out the part where all three of the third-years had threatened to come back and drag Hinata to Karasuno, Kageyama notices.

“Sorry for worrying you,” Hinata says.

“Be sorry for _disappearing,_ ” Nishinoya says, still glaring.

“Sorry, Nishinoya-senpai.”

Nishinoya smiles briefly at the ‘senpai’ before going back to a scowl. “Nope, that’s not gonna work, Shouyou!”

“ _Anyway,_ ” Daichi says in the tone of voice that used to scare the crap out of Kageyama (okay, it still scares the crap out of Kageyama. Oikawa’s captain style is more ‘act adorable and hope my players don’t kill me’; he has _nothing_ on Daichi). “It’s good to see you on the court again.”

“Practice,” Nishinoya adds, shaking a finger at him. “I could tell all the way up in the stands that your jump’s gotten worse.”

Hinata’s face falls again at that. “Yes, Nishinoya-senpai.”

Suga, still watching him, frowns. “Hinata?”

“Is there anything you want to talk about?” Asahi asks. “We’re here.”

“Mmhmm,” Suga says, grinning. “Just ‘cause we graduated doesn’t mean we aren’t still here if you need us.”

Hinata opens his mouth, closes it, and shakes his head.

“All right,” Daichi says, ruffling his hair. “Is it okay if we tell the others you’re here with Kageyama?”

Hinata looks down again, but he nods. “Yeah.”

All four of them have Hinata in a hug a second later (Kageyama’s amazed it took so long), and Nishinoya pulls Kageyama in when he doesn’t join in right away.

“Hey,” Kageyama protests, but Nishinoya’s grip on his shirt is as strong as ever, and he gives up and leans into the hug.

“I can’t breathe,” comes Hinata’s muffled voice from the center of the hug pile.

“Tough,” Nishinoya says cheerfully, ruffling his hair and ruining his ponytail. “Sheesh, Shouyou, when did your hair get so long?”

“I thought it wouldn’t stick up so much if I grew it out…” Hinata mumbles. Kageyama resists the urge to tell him that he looks shorter now that his hair (sort of) obeys gravity.

“You have to go,” Nishinoya says, frowning at Sugawara. “You’ll miss your train back.”

“I have an _hour,_ ” Suga says, but he pulls back out of the hug anyway with a sigh and ruffles Hinata’s hair. It’s sticking up all over the place now; his ponytail is basically destroyed. “Good job today, you two.”

“Thanks!” Hinata says, bouncing to his feet. “Can we walk you to the parking lot?”

They do; Hinata fills the spaces in conversation with chatter about what a horrible roommate Kageyama is and how hard college classes are (he gets sympathetic nods from Asahi and Nishinoya). Between the roommate and class talk, he talks about how weird it is to play on the same side of the net as the Grand King (yes, he still calls Oikawa that) and tells them about the rest of their teammates and how amazing they all are. “Not as good as you!” he adds hastily when Nishinoya starts looking downright sulky at his description of their liberos.

They wave their friends off, and Hinata nearly collapses in relief. “Phew…I thought Daichi-san might kill me.”

“I’m surprised he didn’t,” Kageyama says dryly, ignoring the shoulder punch that comes a second later. “You stink. Let’s get back so you can shower.”

“Like you’re any better,” Hinata retorts. “You didn’t even serve!”

“You _barely_ served,” Kageyama snaps back. “And we were on the court for _maybe_ ten minutes.” Hinata sticks his tongue out, but shuts up, and they walk back to their shared room relatively peacefully.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays, y'all! My sister bought me an actual bento from Daiso (apparently there's one in Little Tokyo), so I think I'm officially a weeb now. Oops.  
> Up next: Kageyama and Hinata have A Talk (next week, probably, depending on how soon I get the ending finished. Endings are difficult.) Thanks for reading! :D Also, I keep forgetting to mention, but I do have a tumblr at timidfantasist. Come talk to me about these volleyball dorks!


	3. A Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The one where Kageyama figures it out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I said 'a week' and then 'a couple days', but this chapter is stressing me out on numerous levels, and at this point, it's best to just post it and let y'all judge than keep worrying. Long a/n at the end of this chapter, sorry! Please enjoy.

He wants to play so badly it _hurts_.

There’s Karasuno, led by Ennoshita; he watches Kageyama set to Tanaka, who’s getting much better at blasting through blocks the way Asahi-san used to. He hits a spike straight through two blockers, landing and throwing his fist in the air. Hinata can imagine his speech all the way up here; he’s probably telling the new first-years about how amazing he is.

“Chibi-chan?”

Hinata yelps and jumps so high the hat his hair is all tucked under nearly comes off; he grabs it, making sure it’s still secure, and turns around.

_It’s the Grand King!_

_Since when does he wear glasses?_

“It _is_ you,” Oikawa says, frowning. “Shouldn’t you be down there driving your opponent insane with Tobio-chan?”

Hinata doesn’t respond, partly because he’s still scared of Oikawa, but _mostly_ because of all his former rivals, Oikawa is the _last_ one he wants to find out.

Too late; he spots Hinata’s crutches, tucked neatly under his feet. “You’re hurt.”

Hinata nods, and Oikawa shakes his head. “Sprained?”

“Something like that,” Hinata mutters, and Oikawa shakes his head.

“Shouldn’t you at least be down there cheering for them…ah,” he says, seeing Hinata’s fist clench. “They don’t know, hmm?”

“Don’t need to,” Hinata mutters. “I’ll explain it when I’m back.”

“Yes,” Oikawa says, sitting down next to him and studying the game with a critical eye, “but if you haven’t noticed, about all that Karasuno has going for it is stubbornness. That stubbornness, and that refusal to give up, and that utter disregard for what traditionally works, is how you win. And now…” He gestures. “You’re _why_ they can disregard what traditionally works, and they think you’ve given up on them. Of course they can’t play at their best.”

He sounds way too happy about this. Hinata scowls, suddenly discovering that he’s not _that_ scared of the Grand King. “They don’t need me to win!” He half-yells it before remembering he’s supposedly undercover, and pulls his hat further down on his head.

“No,” Oikawa says, watching Tsukishima jump too late to stop a particularly powerful spike, “but they’ve lost Mr. Refreshing, and that annoyingly good captain, not to mention your ace. And Tobio-chan’s sets are sloppy today,” he adds as Kageyama sets to Ennoshita, who barely hits it over. “I wouldn’t be surprised to see Wakunan overtake them.”

“Stop it,” Hinata says, kicking the bleachers with his good leg. “I’d be down there if I could.”

Oikawa glances sideways at him, and abruptly gets up, watching Kageyama miss an easy block and Nishinoya miss an easy receive. “Better get back fast, Chibi-chan,” he says, “or Karasuno’s going to be a bunch of flightless crows again.” He starts walking away, waving goodbye and joining the Seijoh cheering section.

 _Like I don’t know that,_ Hinata thinks, glaring down at the court.

Nishinoya bombs another receive, and Hinata itches with the need to jump down, onto the court, steal his jersey from whichever first-year has it, and just _play._ So what if he goes to Yukigaoka now? Karasuno _needs_ him.

Wakunan wins. There’s a stunned silence echoing in the gym, because Karasuno has a reputation now, the miracle team that beat Shiratorizawa, and Wakunan defeated them in the second set, 25-18. They hardly even had to work for it.

They’d gone to nationals last year.

They’d _won_ nationals last year, and this year, they’d been knocked out in their first game in the prefectural qualifiers.

Hinata’s sitting in the very back of the Karasuno cheering section, where no one will see him, so he has a perfect view of the team jerseys when they line up. He looks at them, mostly curious as to who wound up with what (Ennoshita is #1, Tanaka #2) and notices something.

There’s no #10.

He spots the other three in his year almost instantly; Kageyama has #6 on, Tsukishima #7, and Yamaguchi #8. There are three first-years; a broad-shouldered one who looks almost as powerful as Asahi, wearing #9, and next to him, a much skinnier boy wearing #11.

 _Maybe they just lined up out of order,_ but no, the last jersey in line is #12.

Hinata’s heart hurts.

 

“Oi, dumbass, let’s go.”

“Huh?” Hinata’s head jerks up, and he groans when he realizes he’s fallen asleep again. Their campus isn’t exactly _safe_ at night, so he and Kageyama stick together on the way back (‘race each other home’ might be more accurate), but since he’s too short to help with the net, he always winds up half-asleep by the time Kageyama finishes cleaning up.

“Time to go,” Kageyama says, rolling his eyes. “Honestly, you’re _never_ this tired after practice.”

“That’s ‘cause the Grand King’s practices are longer,” Hinata mutters, scrubbing at his eyes as he stands up and takes a few steps to stretch. “And there’s more drills. Stuff like Butterfly and Runthrough is _way worse_ than laps…”

“Hinata.”

That’s Kageyama’s _scary voice,_ so Hinata immediately freezes into his best deer-in-headlights expression and slowly looks up to try and gauge Kageyama’s mood. What did he do, did he piss Kageyama off by nearly falling asleep for the millionth time this week?

“You’re limping,” Kageyama says. _Crap._ Hinata moves his leg, twisting it out to the same angle as the other one, and makes extra sure to focus on his feet on his next step.

“Better?” he asks, faking a big yawn.

“Yes,” Kageyama says, “but that’s _not the problem,_ dumbass, why are you limping?”

“Um,” Hinata says, and shuffles uncertainly, trying to come up with a decent lie.

Too late; Kageyama’s eyes narrow, and now there’s no telling him he tripped in practice, or just stepped wrong, or not to worry about it. Kageyama’s stare flicks briefly over to Oikawa, and Hinata remembers that the Grand King knows. He’d told Hinata once, quietly, that he’d told ‘Tobio-chan’ not to push Hinata.

Apparently Kageyama’s decided the Grand King’s full of it. “You’re hurt,” he says, frowning at Hinata’s leg like he thinks it might suddenly give out on Hinata. “What happened?”

Hinata opens his mouth and then closes it. _Nice goldfish impression,_ he can almost hear Tsukishima saying.

“Let’s go back to our room,” he says, chewing on his (already ragged) lip. “The gym’s kinda public.”

Kageyama doesn’t look happy, but he nods, and they go back, Hinata watching his feet and keeping his bad one turned out the whole way. Kageyama swipes them in; they’re only one floor up, fortunately (or unfortunately), and Hinata unlocks their door and flops onto his favorite study beanbag. Kageyama sits on his desk chair, trying and failing for his _patient listening face_ (it’s closer to his _I’m going to murder this idiot_ face, which is pretty much his default when dealing with Hinata).

Hinata doesn’t know where to start, so he tugs his shoes and kneepads off. It takes two seconds (he counts) for Kageyama’s eyes to go to his bad knee and the stupid puckered scar that has turned out to be a _pain in the ass_ to hide. It’s faded a little, but not nearly enough for Kageyama to miss it. He can see Kageyama’s worst-case-scenario problem starting up; time to explain, before he thinks Hinata died or something.

“I broke it,” he says, watching Kageyama (both to make sure he’s listening and to keep an eye on his reactions). “Biking home from Karasuno, I was going home, and this car came up behind me like _whoosh_ and they hit me.” He gestures with his hands, using one hand for his bike and the other for the car. “I didn’t even _notice_ , except I kept trying to stand and it hurt, and I busted my phone, so I couldn’t call for help.”

He can already see Kageyama planning to murder the driver. He’s got the same glint in his eye he gets when Tsukishima goes too far insulting them. It’s actually kind of scary, so Hinata keeps going, hoping to get him away from potential-murder-thoughts. “They were really drunk, they shouldn’t have been driving, but they at least realized they hit me, so I borrowed their phone and called an ambulance when I realized I couldn’t stand. I got lucky, though; I _just_ broke my leg.”

More sarcastic than he meant it to be, oh, well. “Turns out,” he says, forcing cheer into his voice like one of those stupid educational _did-you-know_ videos, “that if you break a bone badly enough and put it in a cast, it won’t heal straight. So I’ve got this metal stick thing in my leg now that the bone kind of…healed around? I don’t understand it that much.” He knows it _works,_ but he couldn’t explain why if his life depended on it (even after researching it after the thousandth _what do you mean you don’t know how it works_ nosy stranger). “I couldn’t make the bike ride to Karasuno, though, and Mom couldn’t drive me. Yukigaoka’s the closest to my house, and it’s on Mom’s way to work.”

He can actually see Kageyama thinking _but why didn’t you tell us._ Hinata’s better at reading Kageyama than Kageyama thinks, due more to Kageyama’s _terrible_ poker face than any actual skill on Hinata’s part. It isn’t hard to tell when he’s angry with Hinata, or upset. Right now he’s obviously trying to be patient.

“I spent vacation and the first couple months of second year waiting for it to heal,” he says. “Everyone kept telling me it wouldn’t be back to normal right away, but I mostly ignored them, ‘cause everyone always said I couldn’t play volleyball at my height too, and I proved _them_ wrong.” He kicks his bedframe, promptly regretting it. _Ow._ “Except _then_ I got the okay to go back to walking without crutches or a wheelchair or anything—I’m not allowed to use a wheelchair anyway, actually, I kept making it go faster than it was supposed to and messing it up.” That earns him Kageyama’s _what-a-dumbass_ expression, which at least feels slightly more normal.

“Physical therapy is _terrible,_ ” he says, making a face. “Like practice, except a million bajillion times worse…stop looking at me like that, I’m _not_ exaggerating, it really does suck!” He breathes, swallowing his pride for the second time tonight. “I, um, couldn’t walk in a straight line. You saw that; usually I can fix it, except when I’m really tired and forget to pay attention. But when I started, I did a bunch of work relearning how to walk properly.” There’s more involved in walking than Hinata had ever realized, and more than once he’d wondered how he _ever_ learned it as a toddler. You have to remember to twist your foot out, put your weight evenly on both legs, keep your stride the same length, and shift your weight from your heel to your toe. It’s _hard._

“I couldn’t really jump off that leg anymore, either,” he continues. (That might be understating it a little.) “I showed them that video Coach Ukai put together for us, so they could see how much I needed it back, and I do about eight million exercises _every single day_ , and it _still_ isn’t all the way fixed.” He does more than he’s supposed to, truth be known. If he’s not tired after his assigned exercises, he does them again until he’s worn out. Practicing extra works for volleyball. “My stamina’s kinda crap, too, ‘cause I wasn’t biking so far every day.” He sees Kageyama make his _oh_ face. “I sort of knew, then, that I wasn’t gonna go back to Karasuno.” He kicks the bedframe again, with his other foot. “So I joined the club at Yukigaoka. The captain was nice about letting me practice, even after I told them I wouldn’t play in matches. The coach was nice, too, but I could tell he thought I was wasting my time ‘cause of my height. I didn’t have my jump anymore to make up for it, yknow? He did like me practicing my receives so much, though; he thought I could maybe be a libero.” Which had been _incredibly_ irritating, actually; he’d hated being mistaken for Karasuno’s libero, and it’s even _worse_ when people know his position and _still_ try to convince him he’d be a better libero.

Kageyama’s gaze has gentled down to the point where Hinata thinks he could meet it without instantly crumbling, so he looks up. “I didn’t expect any of you to be _here,_ ” he says, frowning at Kageyama. “I was sure you’d all be at schools with super-awesome teams. Especially you! What are you even doing here?”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Kageyama asks, making an obvious effort to control his tone (it still scares Hinata, who squeaks and curls further into his beanbag). “Do you know how…” Hinata hears the unspoken _pissed-off_ , but Kageyama doesn’t say it. “…worried we were when you didn’t come back and didn’t contact any of us? Did you seriously think we cared if you needed to take some time off for a goddamn broken leg?”

When he puts it that way, it _does_ sound sort of stupid. Hinata chews on his lip some more, trying to find the words while simultaneously attempting not to worry about Kageyama’s murderous glare. “I didn’t want to be a flightless crow.”

 _“What.”_ Hinata squeaks again; Kageyama sounds pissed.

“That’s what all our rivals used to call us,” Hinata says. “Before we beat Shiratorizawa, remember?” The ‘flightless’ and ‘fallen’ jokes had stopped _very_ quickly after their team had taken down Shiratorizawa. “And they’d be right, now, I’m useless. I was gonna be the team’s ace, I was gonna be the next Little Giant, we were gonna go to nationals together…it was easier to disappear than to have everyone think of me as that promising first-year who _broke his fucking leg_ and _can’t fucking play anymore,_ okay?” Too much swearing; he sees Kageyama’s eyes widen in shock. _Come on, you idiot, you’ve heard me swear before._ It’s something Kageyama’s had to get used to; the first time he’d dropped _fuck_ in a sentence around Hinata, he’d stared until Hinata demanded to know why, and then just pointed out that Hinata used to call him vulgar if he said so much as ‘crap’ around him.

Hinata’s embarrassed to feel tears stinging at his eyes, but he’s committed now. “Of course I missed you,” he says, sniffing to stop his nose from running, “and _of course_ I wanted to be out on the court with you guys, I just…I couldn’t. Couldn’t help you guys win anymore.”

“Let me get this straight,” Kageyama says (Hinata resists the urge to make a joke, this is _not the time_ ). “You never told us where you were, or what happened, because you were worried about what we’d think of you? You thought we’d think less of you, just because you couldn’t play volleyball as well as you used to?”

The last time he’d seen Kageyama this pissed, it had been because Hinata had sent a serve into the back of his head. Hinata makes a tiny scared noise and tries to hide in his beanbag.

“You _idiot,_ ” Kageyama says, huffing out an annoyed breath. “I thought we straightened this out _ages_ ago. You’re important because you’re _you,_ stupid. No one cares if you can’t jump as high anymore. No one would even _notice_ if you weren’t so short.” Hinata has to make an indignant noise at him after that comment, which Kageyama ignores. “And your jump serve is…” His jaw works for a moment, and Hinata lets a little smirk out, seeing him try to avoid saying _better than mine_ (which it _is,_ now, definitely, _take that_ ). “Damn amazing,” he says, finally, “especially since in first year it only made it over the net by sheer luck.”

“I think that’s a little unfair…”

Kageyama taps the back of his head, and Hinata shuts up. “You stupid _dumbass,_ ” Kageyama says, balling his hands into fists. “You seriously thought you could just _vanish_ and have no one notice?”

Hinata hugs his knees to his chest. “I, um, I _did…_ ” Truthfully, he’d known Kageyama would be angry, but not _this_ angry. Kageyama can sync with anyone, after all. He doesn’t _need_ Hinata. It’s always been the other way around (to Hinata’s eternal annoyance).

 _“No,”_ Kageyama says, looking at him like he’s lost his mind. “No, dumbass.” He sinks down into his chair, and Hinata notices (he’s been noticing, actually) the change in how Kageyama carries himself. In high school, he’d walked like, well, a king (an observation he would never in a thousand years say out loud). Now his shoulders droop a lot more, except when he’s racing Hinata, and his eyes stay on his feet when he’s walking.

 _I didn’t mean to,_ Hinata thinks, looking at Kageyama, _but I must have reminded him of that time in middle school._ Even though it’s not the same thing at _all,_ Kageyama has no way of knowing the difference.

He’s trying to think of a way to _make_ Kageyama see the difference when one of their suitemates bangs on the bathroom door. “Hey, you two, are you showering?”

“Oops,” Hinata mutters, gesturing at Kageyama to go. Kageyama shakes his head.

“Go ahead.”

Okay, that’s on the same weirdness level as coming back to the room and finding that Kageyama’s hair has turned pink. “Are you being _nice?”_ Hinata asks, mock-horrified.

“Just go,” Kageyama says.

“Thanks, Kageyama-kun,” Hinata says, trying to break the mood as he grabs his towel and skips into the bathroom, acting stupid on purpose because a pissed-off Kageyama is way better than a sad one. He can practically _hear_ Kageyama’s eyes rolling behind him and grins. _That’s a good start._

 

Kageyama leans back and listens to Hinata’s off-key shower singing.

An injury is something he’s never so much as considered. Hinata got tired of him, yes; Hinata died, yes (briefly, before Takeda had confirmed he was attending another school); Hinata had decided to play another sport that didn’t rely so much on height, yes. Despite the shaking and stuttering and bathroom visits before matches, he’s always sort of considered Hinata indestructible. He ran blindingly fast, jumped for Kageyama’s impossibly quick sets, and he had an apparently endless source of energy and optimism that only occasionally gets taken over by mini-anxiety attacks.

But now?

Kageyama listens to the water running in the bathroom and sighs. Hinata’s _fragile,_ now, or he seems that way. He misses high school, when Hinata had been behind him, always ready for his toss, always jumping and leading blockers and demanding sets, shouting at him and arguing and just being _Hinata._

He showers after Hinata, and they both collapse into bed early; practice had been rough, and on top of the exhaustion from their five thousand drills, Kageyama still hasn’t totally processed the talk with Hinata.

So Kageyama closes his eyes and lets himself fall into sleep.

_Setting on the court; it’s their match point, and he feels Hinata behind him, racing up and left. The blockers can’t catch them, not together; Kageyama sets it, feeling a rush of happiness, and hears it hit the ground._

_Hinata didn’t swing._

_He lands just fine, turning to face Kageyama. “Sorry, Kageyama, I have to leave.”_

_“What are you doing?” Kageyama snaps at him. “You jumped! You were there!” He strides toward Hinata, intending to grab his jersey, and his hand passes right through his collar._

_“I have to leave,” Hinata repeats, and then he turns his back on Kageyama and jogs away._

_“Wait,” Kageyama yells after his retreating back. “Come back here!”_

_“I can’t!” Hinata calls; his hair is fading, his unmistakable orange hair, and all Kageyama can see anymore is his jersey number._

_#9 and #10._

_They were supposed to stand on the world stage together._

_Hinata’s jersey number fades away, and Kageyama’s left standing on a silent volleyball court, back to the net._

_“Is it so surprising?” Suga asks, smiling gently at him. “He got tired of you pushing him around.”_

_“I’m amazed he put up with you for a whole year,” Tanaka says, shaking his head._

_“Always expecting him to be there wherever you toss,” Asahi agrees. “It must be exhausting.”_

_“It’s not like that,” Kageyama protests, but it sounds weak even to his own ears. “He likes hitting my tosses, he said so.”_

_“But he wouldn’t have left if he wasn’t sick of the King,” Tsukishima says, the familiar insufferable smirk on his face. “He’s tired of you calling all the shots.”_

_He’d perfected his falling toss, just for Hinata; just so Hinata would have an easier time fighting in midair. Just so Hinata would never look at him like that again._

_And Hinata had left him anyway._

_“Kageyama!”_

“Kageyama, wake up…” Kageyama blinks his eyes open; Hinata’s shaking his shoulder, and the light’s turned on. There’s a weird noise in the room that he can’t immediately identify, but Hinata sighs in relief. “Come on, we have to go.”

“Go?” Kageyama asks, trying to shake off his nightmare. Hinata’s not gone; Hinata’s in front of him. And none of his teammates had reacted anything like that. Even Tsukishima had toned down the ‘King’ jokes their second year. (Their second year had thoroughly sucked, truth be told, just in general; Ennoshita had tried to make the best of a bad situation, but they didn’t quite bounce back from Hinata’s loss.)

“That’s the fire alarm,” Hinata says, waving a hand in the general direction that the horrible shrieking noise is coming from. “Come on, we gotta go or we’ll get in trouble.”

He’d completely forgotten about the late-night fire drill that all the residence halls have to go through to make sure everyone knew what the fire alarm sounds like (apparently for good reason; it sounds like a particularly sick sheep) and how to get out. He rolls out of bed, finding his shoes and grabbing a jacket. “Let’s go.”

They run down the stairs (they’re only one floor up, thankfully) and out the door, and wait for the building to be swept to ensure everyone is actually outside.

“Hey,” Hinata says, looking sideways at him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m _fine,_ ” Kageyama says in his very best don’t-ask tone.

Hinata nods. “It’s just…you were sort of talking in your sleep.”

Crap. “I don’t do that.”

“You used to all the time at training camp,” Hinata says, raising an eyebrow at him. “Daichi-san said not to mention it to you.”

Double crap.

“Actually,” Hinata says, frowning, “Daichi-san threatened to kill Tsukishima if he ever mentioned it to you…anyway, that’s not important!”

Kageyama shrugs. “Bad dream.”

“Well, _duh,_ ” Hinata says, squinting at him with the annoyed look he reserves specifically for Kageyama.

“Just about a bad volleyball game,” Kageyama says. _Technically not a lie._

Hinata laughs. “Of course you dream about volleyball…”

 _No,_ Kageyama wants to say, _I dream about you,_ but of course there are any number of ways _that_ could be interpreted wrong, and technically, he’s dreaming about Hinata within the context of volleyball, and the words catch in his throat.

Hinata’s hair is all sleep-ruffled and falling in his eyes without his headband. He’s pushing it back, grumbling in annoyance and standing on his tiptoes to see if they’ve been given the all-clear yet, straining to see higher. And he has proper pajama shorts on, Kageyama realizes; he must have been wearing the sweatpants to bed just so Kageyama wouldn’t see his scar.

Even if Hinata’s a little slower, now, and even if this version has a stupid tiny ponytail, Hinata’s come back.

“Oh, we’re going in!” Hinata calls; the shriek of the door alarm as it’s held open too long fills the air, and Kageyama tries to shoulder people aside to fit through with Hinata. It doesn’t _seem_ like this many people live in their hall, normally, but now that they all want to go back to their rooms at once, it’s an impressive bottleneck.

“Kageyama?” Hinata asks, sitting up _just_ as Kageyama’s about to turn off the light so they can go back to sleep.

“It’s one in the goddamn morning, Hinata.”

“You know I’m not leaving again, right?” Hinata asks, ignoring him and fixing him with that intense stare that used to mean _give me a toss right now,_ or the first time he’d seen it, _I just lost to you, and I’m never letting it happen again_.

“Obviously, dumbass,” Kageyama huffs at him, turning off their light and going to bed.

He doesn’t dream for the rest of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, a/n time. Those of you who guessed an injury, congratulations. ((To the person who guessed werewolves, please write that, it sounds like a fun read.) I’ve wanted to do a character-injury fic for a while, but the ones I’ve seen tend to focus on the immediate aftermath (this fandom loves hurting poor Hinata, seriously, what did this kid do to you guys, and I absolutely adore Kagehina hurt/comfort but I wanted to try a focus more on the long-term effects of a serious injury). I was also a little worried about fudging the science or writing a stereotype.  
> ...Which is why I wound up giving Hinata an injury I've actually dealt with and know how to write. In my defense, the concept of a character who relies so heavily on his jump breaking a leg seemed like an interesting premise. A couple of things: 1. Yes, it is possible to break your leg and not notice immediately. 2. The ‘metal stick thing’ Hinata refers to is real; the fancy medical term for it is ‘open reduction internal fixation’, which seems like a lot of words for ‘steel rod in leg’ to me, tbh. I’ve never set a metal detector off yet, for those curious (Mom’s always very disappointed). It does leave a scar; it’s a straight line and the very scientific measurement of slightly longer than my thumb. 3. Hinata’s tired-limp is also from personal experience; there’s a point where I’m just Too Tired to remember to point my foot straight. The actual way he got injured is not personal experience; that came from me realizing that Hinata has a half-hour bike ride, both ways, in the dark. And he doesn’t have a helmet.   
> Third: Characterization. Some of this used to be in the actual chapter, when it was written from Kageyama’s point of view, but then I took it out when I rewrote it, oops. The way I see Hinata, basically, is that in spite of all the anxiety attacks and begging older players to show him how they do things and pestering Kageyama for tosses, he has more stubborn pride than the entire rest of the team put together. That, plus abandonment issues nearly as bad as Kageyama’s (his belief that he has to be useful to the team, specifically Kageyama, especially early in the first season), plus the fact that breaking a leg means he absolutely couldn’t make it over the mountain, made me think that if he was injured enough to stop playing volleyball, he might just leave and not give anyone the chance to make fun of him. (Not that Karasuno would, but, yknow.) I hope it doesn’t feel too weird. Also I hope this wording actually makes sense. I think I used all my good English on the actual chapter, sorry.  
> Fourth: Drills. “Runthrough” refers to a drill where someone (usually a setter) hits a ball overhand, and you have to run to it and receive it without stopping. It’s usually all-out sprinting (the ball moves fast), and it’s as exhausting as it sounds. “Butterfly” is a drill where you serve a ball over the net, receive it on the other side, and act as a target for the receiver to aim for in sequence. It’s named butterfly because of the pattern the lines form in; you receive in a line, but there’s only ever one target on each side of the net, so it looks like wings flaring out.  
> This was a tough one to write, honestly, and I didn't mean to post it until after I had the ending done, but I also have 0 impulse control and everyone's been so damn /nice/ about this fic so far. Seriously, I love you all. Thanks so much for reading this, and see you next time!


	4. Sleepover

Hinata insists that he’s fine.

His leg is fine, he says; it’s healed up now, it’s okay, shut up and set the ball, Kageyama.

But Kageyama can’t stop worrying. What if he breaks it again? That would _suck,_ wouldn’t it? Hinata’s been working so hard, and for what? Two centimeters of added jump height? (Hinata whoops when they check and Kageyama measures, undeterred by the fact that it’s still lower than it used to be.) Hinata exercises every waking minute, especially now that Kageyama knows; he runs everywhere (which means Kageyama also runs everywhere, because Hinata is _not_ allowed to defeat him), jumps, does a bunch of weird exercises that he says are from physical therapy, and works his heart out in practice. He’s obviously frustrated by his speed and jumping power, but being Hinata, he just works ridiculously hard to get it back, to the point where Kageyama and Oikawa have actually started teaming up to make him rest. (Oikawa’s started quizzing him on his homework and whether or not he’s done all of it and scolding him; if Kageyama didn’t know better, he’d swear Oikawa _cares_ about Hinata.)

It’s an adjustment, of course, and Kageyama still occasionally forgets and rockets a too-fast toss toward Hinata (the libero on their team, Yaku from Nekoma, has started discreetly moving behind Hinata when he spikes so he can save them more easily), but for the most part, they’re playing decently well together.

He’s practicing, too; it is _damn_ difficult to slow down the falling toss, but he’ll get it eventually, and then Hinata will have his advantage in the air back. (The falling toss is sort of rusty in general, actually; no one except Hinata can hit it, and Hinata left, so he hasn’t practiced it in years.)

“Hey, Hinata,” Kageyama says, stretching forward to match Hinata next to him.

Hinata hums in response, _I’m stretching, can’t talk._

“Are you _sure_ your leg’s okay?” Kageyama asks, and Hinata sits up in surprise.

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“You _broke_ it,” Kageyama says.

Hinata snorts, and then, looking at Kageyama, “You’re really actually worried, aren’t you.”

“Maybe,” Kageyama says.

Hinata sighs and turns to face Kageyama, stretching his bad leg out. He feels around the lower half before nodding and grabbing Kageyama’s hand, ignoring his protests, and puts it down at one specific spot.

“Feel that?” he asks, raising his eyebrows.

“You’ve got a bump,” Kageyama says, frowning. It’s right there under his fingers, a tiny raised spot on Hinata’s leg. “What is that, is that bad?”

Hinata groans. “No, stupid. See, bones don’t heal straight, exactly, they form a big giant lump around the break, and now I have a bump where the break was.” He pokes at it; the spot is about halfway down his leg, and invisible, more or less. “It’d be really hard for it to shatter like it did again, cause of that. I’m at more risk of breaking my other leg,” he adds, grinning at Kageyama. “This one’s super-mega strong.”

He is so damned _casual_ about this.

“Seriously, it’s fine,” Hinata says, going back to stretching. “Don’t worry so much.”

“All right,” Oikawa calls, clapping his hands and waiting for everyone to run over to him. “Practice game today…don’t look at me like that, it’s this or Butterfly.”

The Fukurodani spiker on Kageyama’s team goes red. “This is fine.” (Everyone is _damn_ sick of running drills.)

“My team on this side,” Oikawa calls. “B-team on the other side.”

Kageyama notices that the practice jerseys are a light aqua color for Oikawa’s team and bright orange for his own team.

Hilarious.

“Hey,” Kageyama whispers, huddling with his team. “We’re changing the rotation.” He points at the Fukurodani wing spiker, trying to remember his name. “Sarukui-san, would you mind switching with Hinata?”

“Never played middle, but I can try it,” he says, grinning. “Hinata-kun’s a better receiver than me, anyway.”

Hinata gives him a raised-eyebrow _what are you doing_ look, which he ignores, and switches positions. Oikawa barely spares it a glance.

 _This way Hinata blocks and spikes less,_ Kageyama thinks, _and he’ll be playing defense more often. Making him a middle blocker made sense in high school, but his play style is different now. Can’t have him jump and get blocked too much or he’ll get discouraged._

Oikawa’s side serves first, and the game is on; Kageyama loses his Hinata-related worries in a blur of setting and serving and “Cover!” and “Chance ball!” and calls for tosses.

Halfway through the second set, Seijoh’s ahead (Kageyama should really stop thinking of them as ‘Seijoh’ just because Oikawa’s the setter). Hinata sends him the ball and then takes off, yelling “Give it to me!”

The blockers on the other side are already moving to intercept Kageyama’s left-side spiker, and Kageyama absolutely cannot resist such a perfect setup; it’s like they’re inviting him to use Hinata (who, admittedly, hasn’t spiked one all game).

He sets the ball and hears it slam down on the other side of the court, and Hinata’s shouted triumphant “YES!” makes the glare his left-wing spiker sends him for using him as a decoy completely worth it.

Hinata’s eyes are shining as he lands, and he has a wide grin on his face, and he’s _laughing._

They still lose, after Oikawa gets his team to watch Kageyama instead of marking spikers (Hinata can’t quite lead the blockers and dash the way he used to), but it’s _damn_ close, and they take a set, and Kageyama decides it’s a draw at best.

Even if Oikawa is wearing his insufferable smirk again.

Their team is as awkward as first-year Karasuno at the Inter-High; Kageyama, Hinata, a wing spiker from Fukurodani, a libero and Inuoka from Nekoma, a middle blocker from somewhere Kageyama’s never heard of called Iwatobi, and a former ace from Shinzen. He doesn’t know any of them well, and they get fewer chances to play as a unit (they’re generally subbed in when someone from the A-team needs a break).

But Kageyama can’t stop a surge of pride when they take that second set, anyway.

He hadn’t quite realized how much he’d missed Hinata’s blind faith in his setting until he felt that rush of wind behind him and heard Hinata’s yell for a toss again. No one else just _jumps_ wherever they please, trusting him to shoot the ball into their hand’s path.

Hinata runs up to him, eyes still sparkling with the sheer happiness he reserves just for Kageyama’s tosses (and meat buns, and tournaments, and okay, maybe a _few_ things besides Kageyama’s tosses). “We almost had it! Next time…”

“Next time,” Kageyama says, “we’ll get them back.”

“Yeah!” Hinata says, bouncing on his heels. He looks like he’s about to fall over, though, in spite of his excitement, so Kageyama suggests gently that they go back to their little dorm room.

Hinata promptly collapses into his bed. “I’m so tired…”

Kageyama goes to shower, because Hinata doesn’t look like he’s moving anytime soon, and sure enough Hinata’s still flopped onto his bed when he gets out. “You’ll get your sheets all sweaty, dumbass.” He remembers, still, when Hinata could run three practice matches in a row and not get tired.

 _Things change,_ he tells himself.

He falls into his own bed, only to discover that Hinata’s apparently interpreted his comment as “get _my_ sheets sweaty instead of yours”. “Hey!”

Hinata just laughs quietly and rolls to give Kageyama more room; his dorm bed is really _not_ a two-person bed (it’s barely big enough for Kageyama as it is), and Hinata winds up squished against the wall.

“You can’t sleep in my bed,” Kageyama says, poking him to try and get him to wake up. “Go shower. You stink.”

“Don’t want to,” Hinata mutters.

Kageyama sighs, gets up, and drags Hinata’s mattress off the bed, rearranging their room to get an empty space in the middle. Hinata rolls over again and opens one eye to stare at Kageyama with. “What’re you doing?”

Kageyama responds by picking up Hinata (who has gotten _heavy,_ but still light enough to at least sort-of carry) and dropping him in the bathroom. “Shower.”

“Ow!” Hinata yelps, but he hears the water running a minute later, at least. Kageyama spends the time pulling his own mattress into the middle (this requires an irritating amount of furniture-rearranging) and changing his sheets, reminding himself to thank the third-years for insisting he have two sets.

Hinata comes out of the shower, towel wrapped firmly around his waist, and gets dressed (Kageyama turns pointedly toward the door), blinking down at their mattresses. “What’d you do?”

“If you’re going to _insist_ on a sleepover,” Kageyama says, gesturing, “I thought we could set it up like how we used to do the futons at training camp.”

“Oh.” Hinata plops onto his bed, curling under the covers, and hums happily. “This is nice.”

“Don’t forget to set your alarm,” Kageyama says; Hinata fishes his phone out of his pocket and taps something, throwing it in the general direction of his bed frame. Kageyama yawns and turns out the light; it’s early, to sleep, but they both have morning practice tomorrow and they’re both exhausted, and it doesn’t take long for them to fall asleep.

 

“Uh.” Kageyama cracks an eye open. It’s dark, he’s hot, and something’s tickling his nose.

He looks down, just to check; Hinata’s asleep on his chest, hair falling in a dumb fluffy curtain around him, snoring gently, just like he used to at training camps. He has an irritating tendency to sleep-hug whoever’s next to him; he always apologizes as soon as he wakes up (inevitably also waking up whoever he’s hugging and anyone else in earshot). Kageyama used to be good at slipping out and stuffing a pillow in to replace him so Hinata wouldn’t wake the _entire team_ up in the morning.

But it’s been two years, and even though he can’t be _that_ comfortable a pillow, Hinata looks content, huffing little snoring noises through his nose and totally relaxed for once. He’s constantly moving while he’s awake; it’s sort of weird to see him so still. It’s like watching a fire that doesn’t flicker.

Also, as long as Hinata’s holding on to him, Kageyama knows he’s still here. It’s hard to worry that he might leave when he’s hanging on to Kageyama so tightly.

So he just shuts his eyes and goes back to sleep and resigns himself to probably being woken up by a shriek and a shouted apology tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good news: Ending is basically completed now  
> Bad news: Ending is super short, and I need to rethink where my chapter breaks are currently. But it's all written! The next one should be up in a couple of days, once I proofread it and rearrange a bit.  
> Happy New Year, everyone! :D Thanks for reading, as always.


	5. One More Time

Kageyama hears Hinata’s alarm go off; he keeps it set to a particularly annoying high-pitched anime song, mostly because he knows Kageyama will wake up to make it stop singing.

Today, though, Kageyama’s comfortable, and Hinata’s still asleep on him, and the sound of the singer’s voice drilling into his ears bothers him less than usual.

The feeling lasts exactly two seconds before Hinata emits a noise he didn’t know was in the human vocal range and jumps backward. “Ah! Crap!”

So much for sleeping in (Oikawa would kill them both anyway); Kageyama groans and opens his eyes. “What?”

Hinata’s turned bright red. “Nothing,” he says quickly, and turns off his alarm, which is still happily playing _that song._

Kageyama reluctantly crawls out of bed too, leaving their mattresses on the floor; they can move them later. “Ugh.”

Hinata yawns. “Hey, Kageyama?”

Kageyama doesn’t respond (he’s fishing around in his drawer for a brush), but Hinata continues anyway. “Can we try the floaty quick today?”

“The floaty quick?” Kageyama repeats, staring at him.

Hinata nods. “You know, the _whoosh-stop-bam_ one.”

Ah. The falling toss.

The one Kageyama still can’t slow down enough for Hinata. (Or at all.)

“After practice,” Kageyama says; Hinata lights up and skips over to his nightstand to find clean clothes.

Kageyama tries to ignore the warm fuzzy feeling he always gets when Hinata gives him that smile. _Think of Tsukishima._ (He borrowed this from Asahi-san, reasoning that if you can be less scared by remembering a scarier thing, you can get rid of warm fuzzy feelings by thinking of the least warm and fuzzy person you happen to know. It works surprisingly well.)

Hinata can barely make it through practice; he’s too excited and keeps missing easy receives. His jump serve flies into the wall after a too-enthusiastic jump that hits the serve up instead of down, and Oikawa can barely stop laughing long enough to throw the ball back over.

“Dumbass, you have to _aim_ when you serve!” Kageyama yells over his shoulder.

“I know!” Hinata yells back, sticking his tongue out.

“Hey, hey,” Oikawa says, wrestling down a smirk. “Go again, chibi-chan.”

Kageyama makes sure Hinata sees him cover the back of his head with his hands.

He’s not completely surprised when it whistles through the air and straight into his head.

Oikawa collapses into laughter (he is the worst captain _ever_ ), and Hinata innocently whistles and calls “Sorry, Kageyama-kun!” It’s the ‘kun’ more than anything else that tells Kageyama that wasn’t an accident; Hinata _never_ gives him an honorific unless he’s poking fun.

He turns and growls and stalks toward Hinata, and Oikawa calls, “Now, now, Tobio-chan, I’m sure he didn’t mean it. Pass the ball, chibi-chan!” Hinata kicks it over, and Oikawa bounces it on the ground, backing up to serve, and then of course Kageyama has to move back to his position because they’re still playing.

In his more cynical moods, he would swear Oikawa actually _likes_ Hinata (he probably just thinks it’s funny when the two of them fight).

He still stays late to do the ‘floaty quick’, though; Oikawa tells them to take down the net when they’re done and leaves, and Hinata immediately grabs a ball and runs to the line, bouncing impatiently while Kageyama gets into setter position.

Hinata puts his head down and _runs_ once he throws the ball for Kageyama, faster than he usually does in practice. _He’s trying for his old speed,_ Kageyama realizes; he knows that some of Hinata’s speed loss is because his stamina sucks and he’s trying to build it back up, but Hinata’s runup is barely any slower than it was in high school. He hadn’t quite seen how _much_ Hinata’s been holding back.

Oh, right. Set the toss. Kageyama lifts his hands and sends the ball, praying that it’ll sync. Hinata jumps, sort of tips it over, and lands with a laugh. “See, we can…” He stops and bends over, pulling in a long breath. “Can so still do it!” Even just that short run-up is tiring after practice, apparently.

“Water,” Kageyama orders. “And go get the ball.” Hinata nods and jogs off, returning with the ball in one hand.

“Go slower,” Kageyama says, folding his arms. “It’s my job to sync with you, remember? You don’t run faster for Oikawa-san.”

“You’re not the Grand King,” Hinata responds, lowering the water bottle. “And it’s our quick! What’s the point if I don’t go fast?”

 _Our_ quick, not ‘the whoosh-stop-bam’ quick.

“Trust me,” Kageyama orders as Hinata goes back to the line. “Slow down.”

Hinata throws him the ball and bolts up to the net, maybe a _little_ slower. Kageyama takes a breath and holds it, sending the ball to him. _Shit, too high._

He barely gets it over, though, and lands and gives Kageyama an _I told you so_ expression, pausing for another water swallow.

“This’ll be useless in a match if you can’t do it without stopping every time,” Kageyama says, and Hinata scowls at him.

“I know!” He stomps his foot. “But if I don’t run fast, I won’t get used to it again…”

“It doesn’t matter,” Kageyama says. “Your speed isn’t as important as being able to hit this properly. Just trust me.” The whole point of the falling toss is to give Hinata a chance at fighting midair; that’s even _more_ important now that he can’t jump quite as high.

Hinata’s slower on his third runup, and Kageyama sets it as slowly as he can, cursing when it flies right past Hinata. _I overshot._

“Trust you?” Hinata asks, returning with the ball.

“Shut up and go again.” Hinata snorts and tosses him the ball, starting his run again.

He’s practiced this _eight million times_ by now, dammit; he’s supposed to be a genius. What will Oikawa say if he can’t do this?

…Okay, visualizing Oikawa isn’t helping. He sees Hinata take off, feeling like the world’s slowed down; Hinata’s watching him, waiting for the ball. He crouches, jumps; the ball leaves Kageyama’s fingertips, and _yes,_ it stops right where it’s supposed to and Hinata swings, and the ball hits the other side of the court with a solid _wham._

Hinata lands too hard, hitting the ground on his shoulder and rolling back up, and laughs. “We did it!” he yells, running toward Kageyama for a high-five. “We did it we did it we did it!”

He’s missed that smile, too.

Kageyama lifts his hands and lets Hinata run into him, ignoring the sting (Hinata’s high fives have always been ridiculously strong).

“Let’s do it again.”

He hadn’t thought it was possible for that smile to get wider, but it does, Hinata beaming up at him. “Yeah!” He grabs the ball and throws it again.

 _One more time,_ Kageyama thinks, watching his lost spiker. _That’s always how it was with you. One more toss, one more game, one more minute._

He sets it and knows without looking that Hinata will hit it; an instant later, and it’s sailing through the air and hits the court, just inside the line.

_One more time._

 

He doesn’t fix their mattresses, that night; Hinata seems perfectly content to fall asleep next to him again, and it isn’t like their standard-college-issue mattresses are any more comfortable when they’re on the bedframe. Besides, they’re both thoroughly worn out.

So Kageyama just crawls under the covers and shuts his eyes, listening to Hinata breathe. It’s reassuring to hear that particular annoying snore. If he’s snoring, he’s still here. (Kageyama still has trouble with believing he’s back, sometimes.)

He doesn’t even mind when he wakes up to find Hinata snuggled onto him again. Hinata’s here. That’s all that matters.

And he doesn’t dream, for once, not with Hinata’s hair tickling his chin and the sound of Hinata’s snores filling the air.

He opens his eyes the next morning and discovers that they’ve somehow gotten more tangled up than usual.

He’s wrapped at least as firmly onto Hinata as Hinata is onto him; Hinata’s face is buried in his chest, and his chin is hooked over Hinata’s shoulder. They’re both still under their respective blanket sets; it’s pretty much just a hug, except horizontal.

Kageyama feels Hinata’s breathing change and shuts his eyes, pretending to be asleep, even when he hears Hinata’s quiet squeak of surprise. Kageyama’s _never_ hugged back when this happens, and now Hinata can’t get loose.

“Crap,” Hinata mutters, and then taps his shoulder. “Kageyama, wake up…”

Kageyama blinks his eyes open. “What?”

“Get off me,” Hinata says, shoving at him with his free arm and huffing in annoyance. “We gotta get up.”

“It’s the _weekend,_ ” Kageyama says. He knows he should be tossing Hinata across the room for the snuggling thing, but well, it’s his fault too. And he’s tired, and he _really_ wants to sleep more. “We don’t have to be anywhere.”

“Well…” Hinata stops and lets out an irritated breath that Kageyama (correctly) interprets as _this idiot will be the death of me_. “Yeah, but we’re…is this okay?” he asks, tilting his chin up to look at Kageyama.

“I don’t care,” Kageyama says. “I learned how to get out of this when you did it at camp in high school, dumbass, if I cared I wouldn’t be here.”

Hinata flushes (he can see it in the dim light coming in from their window). “I didn’t mean to…”

“I know,” Kageyama says. “Hinata, it’s five in the morning, will you _please_ just go back to sleep.” He’s so tired he thinks the room might be swimming in front of him.

He thinks he feels Hinata tighten his grip on Kageyama before his eyes close and his breathing evens out into snoring again.

 

They wake up late in the morning, still cuddling; Hinata’s hair is fanned around Kageyama’s pillow in his usual poofy-dandelion impression. (Well, Kageyama supposes you’d have to spray-paint the dandelion orange first, but apart from that.) Kageyama untangles his arm without commenting, and Hinata pulls his arms away and grimaces, shaking the one that had been trapped under Kageyama. “I can’t feel my arm…”

“It’s just asleep,” Kageyama says, unsympathetic; it’s not _his_ fault Hinata insists on sleep-cuddling.

“I think it’s dead,” Hinata says, poking it. It’s sort of flopped over; Hinata’s maneuvering it with his other arm. Is that normal for limbs that fall asleep? Kageyama’s just starting to panic about potentially murdering Hinata’s arm when Hinata draws in a hiss of breath. “Ow ow ow owwwww…” He rubs his arm, wincing. “It’s so _prickly._ ”

Kageyama rolls out of bed, ignoring Hinata. “Fix your mattress,” he calls over his shoulder, going into their little bathroom and finding his brush and yanking it through his hair until it’s straight and lies flat again. He wonders, briefly, if poofy hair is contagious.

When he gets back out, Hinata’s out of bed and getting dressed; Kageyama walks in, since it’s not like they haven’t seen each other changing a million times in high school. “Hey. Fix your mattress.”

“Don’t wanna,” Hinata says, yawning. “You messed it up.”

“Only because your disgusting sweaty ass was in my bed.” Hinata sticks his tongue out at that and finishes pulling on a shirt, shaking out his hair and pulling it back into his usual ridiculous ponytail-headband combination. He hears Hinata’s stomach growl (and sees Hinata’s ears turn red).

“Breakfast?” Kageyama asks, and Hinata turns around and grins.

“Race you.” He has the door open and dashes down the hallway before Kageyama can so much as agree.

They manage to get out of the hall before Kageyama starts yelling after him that he’s cheating and _this so doesn’t count._ They get a few raised eyebrows when they collapse into the dining hall, but most of the students are used to their races by now, and they only get one concerned professor asking if they’re okay. (Their current concerned-adult record is five, after one race where Hinata had leapt up half the staircase to beat him and tripped and nearly given Kageyama a heart attack.)

“I beat you,” Hinata gasps out, smirking at him.

“You had a head start,” Kageyama responds. “Doesn’t count.”

“Does so.”

“Does not,” Kageyama says.

“Oikawa-san, aren’t those your teammates?”

“Freshmen,” Oikawa’s cheery voice says from the stairs. “I try my best, but you know how first-years are.”

Kageyama growls in Oikawa’s general direction and pushes himself to his feet to go scan his card and get food, because he actually might die if he doesn’t eat.

(Hinata drinks an entire glass of water before he’s even gotten his milk.)

“Dumbass, you’ll make yourself sick,” Kageyama says, watching Hinata wolf his food down. Hinata stops briefly to look at him and bursts out laughing. “What?”

“You’ve got a milk mustache,” Hinata says, snorting. “ _Already._ ”

“I do _not._ ”

Hinata snaps a picture (he’s gotten a smartphone, somewhere in the last three years) and triumphantly shows it to him, milk mustache and all. Kageyama just growls at him and wipes it with a napkin. “You’ve got egg on your nose.” He takes his own picture before Hinata can clean it.

Hinata sticks his tongue out. “At least I don’t have milk all over my face.”

“That’s because you’re drinking water!”

“ _Was_ drinking,” Hinata says, picking up his empty glass. “I’m done already. Two hundred twenty-two to two-nineteen.”

“It doesn’t _count_ if we don’t start at the same time, idiot,” Kageyama snaps, draining his milk. “It’s two-twenty-one.”

(Kageyama remembers exactly where they were after their first year; Kageyama had been ahead by one race, and Hinata had left vowing revenge on the last day of school.)

(He’d never been so unhappy to win something.)

(But he’d kept a note of their score, just in case.)

“Kageyama,” Hinata says, waving a hand in front of his face. “Hey. Fine, two-twenty-one. Kageyamaaa…”

“Hurry up and finish your food so we can practice,” Kageyama says, stabbing his own food and lifting it to his mouth without an explanation.

Hinata doesn’t bring up the cuddling thing, and neither does Kageyama, but their beds don’t move back that night, either. Somehow, they just always seem to be too busy to think about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter next time! It'll probably be up before Monday, because winter break's gotten away from me and classes for spring semester start Tuesday. Dx Thanks for reading; I hope everyone's still enjoying this!!


	6. Semester Break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One semester can disappear before you even notice it passing.

The semester passes in a blur of lectures and reading and volleyball (mostly volleyball), and it’s finals week before they know it. Hinata falls asleep crying over English on his desk; Kageyama moves him to his bed and puts the blanket over him and denies any involvement when Hinata wakes up snuggled against him the next morning. Two days later, it’s Hinata shaking him awake with a fresh cup of coffee for his too-goddamn-early math final, yawning and bleary-eyed and clearly half-asleep. Kageyama hears a loud _thud_ onto their mattresses as soon as Hinata sees him out the door with a good-luck wave, and hears Hinata’s little snores start up as he locks the door behind him.

Oikawa cancels practice during finals week; he’s getting bags under his eyes, and Kageyama sees him around campus glued to his textbook. (It’s surprisingly motivating, knowing Oikawa is having as much trouble as they are.)

They pass, and nearly die of sheer relief, and then it’s time to go home for the semester.

Which means fixing their beds.

“See you next semester,” Kageyama says, pulling the sheets off his bed and moving his mattress back to the bedframe. He stops and points at Hinata. “You _are_ coming back, right?”

“Of course I am,” Hinata says, blinking at him.

“Promise me,” Kageyama says, staring at him.

Hinata finishes putting his mattress back and turns to face Kageyama. “I’m not gonna leave you, you _idiot._ I told you that.”

 _And then you left anyway,_ but Kageyama swallows it down, remembering Hinata’s promise the night of the fire drill, and nods.

They take the bus home together; Hinata gets off one stop before he does, waving Kageyama off with a wide grin, and Kageyama watches until he can’t see his mess of orange hair anymore.

_He’ll be back._

_He said so._

Kageyama unlocks his house, happy to discover that it’s locked; leaving a building alone for this long is always kind of a gamble. It’s late, and he goes straight to his bed, pulling his blanket aside and curling up under it.

It’s too cold in his bed, even after he digs out his extra blanket, and it takes him a long time to get to sleep.

_Hinata’s arms sweeping behind him as he takes off at a run._

_Hinata crying into his food after Seijoh._

_Hinata shouting at him, Kageyama shouting back. Something’s wrong, this isn’t their usual banter, this is actual angry fighting and swinging with closed fists and yelling so much they don’t even notice Yachi leaving._

_Hinata jumping above Ushijima, Kageyama smirking at the confused look on Ushijima’s face as he realizes that a tiny 165cm first-year out-jumped him._

_Hinata swearing that they’ll win Nationals again next year at the third-years’ graduation, promising them that Karasuno’s in good hands; Asahi bursting into tears and Suga and Daichi holding them back and telling their underclassmen to listen to Ennoshita._

_First day of his second year; Kageyama gets to the gym first and waits for Hinata to show up so he can gloat about it._

_And waits._

_And waits, until Ennoshita has to start practice; their first-years are waiting for them, full of starry-eyed wonder at the chance to play with the team that took Nationals. A few of them look around for the ‘littler giant’; Tsukishima can’t suppress a laugh when he hears that Hinata is shorter than his favorite player. Kageyama doesn’t quite know what to tell them, and settles on the truth; they don’t know where he is, or if he’s coming back._

_He sets too fast to a libero who hates his position, and wants to try offense after seeing Hinata at Nationals, and spends the next five minutes apologizing. Not even Tsukishima has the energy to laugh at him, by that point._

_They didn’t make a great first impression on their new underclassmen._

Kageyama’s eyes open, and he rolls over and hits his phone’s home button to wake it up. Three in the morning. Great. He gets up (forgetting his mattress isn’t on the floor and nearly falling) and makes himself a glass of milk. At least the dreams waited to come back until after final exams.

It’s _still_ too cold when he goes back to sleep.

 

He wakes up to about a million texts and messages.

**_Suga:_ ** _Kageyama and Hinata are back today, right?_

**_Suga:_ ** _I know it’s short notice, but I thought we could all meet up, since everyone’s home for the break!_

**_Tsukishima:_ ** _do we have to_

**_Suga:_ ** _Yes._

**_Kageyama:_ ** _I’ll ask Hinata_

He frowns down at his phone; Suga had told the rest of the team Hinata was at Kageyama’s university and still playing volleyball, but he’s still not sure Hinata wants to deal with the other half of their team seeing him again.

He clicks over to Hinata’s messages; the last one just reads _finished my last exam, im napping, don’t you dare wake me up._

**_Kageyama:_ ** _Hinata, the team’s getting together today. Everyone, I think, do you want to come?_

**_Hinata:_ ** _of course_

Kageyama shrugs and goes back to the group chat to text everyone that Hinata’s coming, too.

He and Hinata are the first ones there; they stand outside Karasuno’s gym.

“Do you think they’d let us practice in there?” Hinata asks, peeking in through a window.

“I doubt it,” Kageyama says.

“Shouyou!” Nishinoya jogs up with a wide grin on his face. “How’d your finals go?”

Hinata droops down instantly. “Please don’t ask, Nishinoya-senpai…”

Nishinoya laughs and nods and gives Hinata a back-slap that leaves him coughing for air. “Me too!”

Kiyoko and Yachi come up next; Yachi instantly tackles Hinata into a hug. “Hinata!”

“Hi, Yachi,” Hinata manages, still struggling for breath.

“We all missed you,” Yachi says, letting go of him (Hinata draws in a deep breath that ends in a cough).

Hinata looks down. “Sorry…”

“Well, look who’s back,” drawls a voice. “The King’s favorite subject.”

He expects Hinata to react, be angry, like he usually was with Tsukishima, but Hinata just laughs. “Missed you too, Tsukishima!” He tilts his head. “Did you get taller? That’s not fair…”

“I did not _miss_ you,” Tsukishima growls at him. (He definitely did; Kageyama counted at least three occasions in their second year when he went looking for Hinata to run block drills with before stopping and turning bright red.) Hinata just beams at him.

Tsukishima _tch_ s and shakes his head.

“Where’s Yamaguchi?” Hinata asks, looking behind Tsukishima to see if he’s hiding.

“Our captain went to get meat buns,” Tsukishima says, watching Hinata, and then “That doesn’t surprise you?”

“You’re both jerks, so no,” Hinata says. “Kageyama can’t even say ‘Nice cover’ without a mean face on, and you’re worse. You don’t even like _high fives.”_

He’s just laid out (in slightly less courteous terms) the second-years’ reasoning behind their strong recommendation that Yamaguchi be the captain for their year. Nishinoya laughs and slaps Hinata’s shoulder, sending him staggering. “It’s good to have you back, Shouyou!”

“Sorry, I’m here,” Yamaguchi calls, waving a bag. The third-years are behind him (minus Kiyoko). “Hi, Hinata.”

Kageyama lifts a hand in return. “Thanks, Yamaguchi,” he says, accepting a meat bun. It’s warm out today, too warm for hot food, but he appreciates the thought. He hasn’t had a meat bun in _forever_ (they’re just not the same at the closest place to his and Hinata’s dorm).

“Thank Coach Ukai,” Yamaguchi says around a mouthful of food. “He and Takeda-sensei say hello, and Hinata, Coach Ukai wants to talk to you when you’re in the area.”

Hinata makes a squeaky noise that might possibly be _okay_ , or might be _save me._

Tanaka appears out of nowhere, the remaining second-years in tow. “Hey, look who’s back!” He ruffles Hinata’s hair, putting on his my-precious-little-underclassman smile.

“Tanaka-senpai!” Hinata says, grinning. “I’ve been watching your tournaments at your school! You’re _amazing;_ you just go _whoosh_ and _bam_ and…”

Tanaka laughs and ruffles Hinata’s hair again (his ponytail is looking sort of scruffy by now). “Damn right I’m amazing!”

“Please don’t encourage him,” Ennoshita says, face in his hands. “Now we’ll never get him to stop bragging…”

Suga laughs. “Let him. I’m sure he’s missed having someone who thinks so much of his talent.”

Tanaka huffs at him. “Hinata’s just the only one who appreciates me.”

“Sure, Ryuu,” Nishinoya says, grinning. Tanaka glares at him.

“What are you implying?”

“ _No fighting,_ ” Daichi says in his Captain Voice; everyone instantly shuts up and looks at him. “Act your ages.”

“That’s about five for some of us…” Tsukishima murmurs, looking sideways at Hinata. Hinata scowls at him, but he’s stopped from replying by Daichi’s glare.

“Eat your meat bun,” Daichi says, and Tsukishima does. “Where are we going?”

“I didn’t plan that far,” Suga says, looking sheepish. “Why don’t we just walk around?”

So they do; just a bunch of boys on their day off, laughing and running around the town and saying hello to old classmates and neighbors. It feels like any other after-practice, except longer; Tsukishima starts looking pained after a while.

They stop at the Sakanoshita store, to talk with Ukai, and Kageyama looks back to find Hinata and freezes and falls back. “Hey, idiot, watch your feet.”

Hinata swears under his breath. “Sorry.” His eyes narrow down at his feet, and the next step he takes is fine. “Better?”

Kageyama nods. “Be careful,” he whispers. “Tsukishima’ll notice that.” Everyone will notice that, given time, but Tsukishima’s always had an eye for injuries. (Not to mention Coach Ukai.) Everyone else has an incredible sense for injured teammates during matches, practice, and…nowhere else. It’s like a sixth sense that switches off. Tsukishima, though, is _always_ watching for potential weaknesses.

“I know,” Hinata mutters, staring down at his feet.

“I,” Tsukishima says, suddenly next to them, “unlike some other people I could name, am capable of using a _search engine._ ” He raises his eyebrow at Hinata. “Your accident made the local newspaper.”

Hinata goes pale. “They said they wouldn’t use my name…”

“They didn’t,” Tsukishima says. “It’s just that the odds of two fifteen-year-olds with orange hair taking the mountain road that afternoon were rather low. It wasn’t difficult to put together. Don’t worry,” he adds. “I’m fairly certain that our teammates took Takeda-sensei at his word and didn’t bother to do any research.” He’s using _the tone,_ the I-am-superior-to-everyone tone that Yamaguchi had mostly managed to stop in their third year (“Save it for our opponents, Tsukki!”), and Kageyama sees red.

“You _knew?_ ” Kageyama hisses.

“Obviously.”

Kageyama’s fist swings, entirely on its own, and knocks Tsukishima sideways. He just adjusts his glasses and gets back up. “King, please, you’ll attract unwanted attention.”

“ _Fuck that,_ ” Kageyama snarls at him. “You _knew?_ ”

He feels someone wrench his hands behind his back before he can try to punch Tsukishima’s insufferable face again. “Hey, cut it out.” _Tanaka._ “You’re scaring Yacchan.”

“He _knew,_ ” Kageyama says, wrenching at Tanaka’s (unfortunately strong) grip.

“Hey.” Hinata steps between him and Tsukishima. “The Grand King knew too, and you didn’t punch _him._ ”

“That’s different!” With Oikawa, it had been a question of why Hinata trusted Oikawa more than Kageyama. Now, with Tsukishima, it’s a matter of Tsukishima knowing and keeping quiet about it. Also, it’s _Tsukishima._

“Tsukishima knew what?” Tanaka asks, still holding Kageyama.

“Nothing,” Hinata says quickly. “Thanks for helping, Tanaka-senpai.”

“Of course,” Tanaka says, grinning and releasing his hold on Kageyama. “Quit fighting. You’ll make Daichi-san mad.”

Kageyama rubs his wrist, which is sore from Tanaka and his goddamn death grip, and glares at Tsukishima, who looks unimpressed. “What.”

“You _knew,_ ” Kageyama repeats.

“Yes,” Tsukishima says, pushing his glasses up, “and if one of your subjects chooses not to share something with you, it’s hardly the place of the other peasants, is it?”

Kageyama’s about to punch him again when he feels Hinata’s hand press around his wrist and looks down to see Hinata with his very best _please_ face on; his shoulders sag and he follows Hinata ahead. _Don’t fight_ is written all over Hinata’s face (although Kageyama can see his shoulders stiffening in an effort to ignore Tsukishima), and he can’t bring himself to ruin Hinata’s day with their old teammates.

Hinata doesn’t move his hand, and even though it’s probably only there to stop Kageyama from punching someone again, Kageyama doesn’t try to get out of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am a terrible person who apparently can't keep track of her own fanfiction. One more chapter, I'm so sorry. And I am also sorry for being so late; I could blame it on college, or I could be honest and blame it on getting super caught up in another fic I'm writing. -coughs- Kind of a monster, that one, so don't expect it any time soon. :D Thank you so much for reading!! Talk to me! Comments save my overworked-student self!


	7. It's a Date

They wind up playing volleyball, of course.

At Karasuno, even; Yamaguchi breaks down in tears when he finds the neatly handwritten _“welcome back, Captain”_ taped to the gym door (he gets sympathetic back-pats from Daichi and Ennoshita), the key carefully attached to the underside of the note. After some debate on the legality of this whole thing, they decide their underclassmen _probably_ wouldn’t have done this without permission, and Yamaguchi unlocks the door. All they have to do is set up the net, which is two minutes’ work. They form into their old teams, Tsukishima ducking onto the former B-team. There’s some confusion with positions (Hinata’s gotten so used to being a wing spiker that Kageyama has to remind him to take his old spot as a middle blocker), but it’s nothing they can’t straighten out.

“We’ve got two captains,” Ennoshita calls, grinning. “We’re going to win!”

“Not if all you can do is make promises you can’t keep,” Daichi shouts back. “Are you going to serve?”

Yamaguchi steps up, and Kageyama winces. This was their favorite tactic third year; change the rotation so that Yamaguchi’s the first one to serve. It throws their opponents off for the very first serve to be a float, and they’d won more than a few early leads that way.

Yamaguchi hits three jump floats before Nishinoya finally saves one, and Hinata instantly takes off, charging one step ahead of Tsukishima. “KAGEYAMA!”

The falling toss is already leaving Kageyama’s hands, and Hinata slams it easily down, landing with a laugh. “ _Ha!”_

Tsukishima’s eye twitches, but Yamaguchi just laughs back. “Don’t mind, Tsukki,” he calls. “You’ll catch him next time.”

Tsukishima does, and Kageyama sends Tanaka the toss. Tsukishima maintains what Yamaguchi calls his ‘game face’ and what Kageyama calls refusing to react in order to piss off his opponents, but he can tell that falling for their old trick’s annoying him.

Hinata rotates into the back line, and Tsukishima smirks. “Be sure not to hit the King’s head,” he calls. Kageyama struggles to keep his own smirk off his face; Hinata’s less successful.

“Shut _up,_ Tsukishima.” Hinata bounces the ball, breathes, throws it toward the ceiling, runs, and jumps.

It’s a good serve; Hinata lands with a wide grin and watches it land between Tsukishima and Kinoshita, who are both too busy staring at Hinata to even try for a receive.

“Nice, Hinata,” Daichi calls, and _now_ Kageyama lets that smirk out. _What, you thought he was just sitting on his ass for two years?_ (He chooses to forget that he had assumed the same thing.)

“One more, Shouyou!” Nishinoya says, tossing him the ball. Hinata nods and serves again, aiming between Sugawara and Ennoshita this time; Sugawara dives and manages to get it up, but now the other team’s got no setter, and Tsukishima has to awkwardly bump it over.

The hours pass, as they always do when volleyball is involved; they take the first set, Yamaguchi’s team takes the next. Kiyoko and Yachi keep score, Yachi cheering and Kiyoko quietly clapping at particularly awesome moments. Sugawara, sometime in the last two years, has learned to be bolder about his tosses and attacks, and twice he gets a dump shot past Kageyama (to the latter’s annoyance).

It takes nine sets, three matches, before they’re all too tired to move and have to call the game off. Everyone’s flushed and smiling; even Tsukishima has a tiny smile on his face, and he doesn’t protest the group hug, either. (He _does_ politely distance himself when Hinata starts bouncing around and hugging everyone individually.)

“Good job today, everyone,” Suga says with a smile, ending it like he would any other practice, and they scatter to crank the net down and clean. The old third-years get surprisingly into cleaning (“Can’t have your underclassmen thinking badly of your old senpais!”), laughing and racing around while Daichi yells at them to slow down before they slip.

“Hey, look what I found!” Nishinoya calls, waving a mop with a handle wound in two different colors of duct tape (black and orange, at Nishinoya’s insistence).

Asahi laughs. “I don’t believe you guys kept that…”

“Our first-years were pretty impressed when they heard our libero once broke a mop,” Tsukishima says, rolling his eyes. “They had low standards.”

“Take that back, Tsukishima!”

Hinata lets out a laugh, beside Kageyama, and then looks up at Kageyama. “Bet I can get more of the floor clean than you…”

“Oh, in your dreams,” and they’re off.

 

Later, they’re walking home in silence for once, full of meat buns, Hinata wheeling his bike as they approach the split where Hinata always used to wave with a smile and assure Kageyama he’d see him tomorrow.

The last place Kageyama had seen Hinata before he’d disappeared.

He knows, intellectually, that Hinata isn’t going to leave again, but Hinata’s swinging one leg over his bike now, and Kageyama can’t stop thinking about _last_ time this happened.

_“See you next year!”_

“Hinata,” and then Kageyama forgets how to talk. It’s enough to make Hinata pause and look over his shoulder, though.

“Huh?”

“It’s pretty dark,” Kageyama starts.

Hinata glances up at the still-bright sky (summer nights; even as late as it is, they have a good hour of sunlight left), but doesn’t say anything.

“And I know it’s a hard ride after sunset,” Kageyama continues (Hinata has a bike light, and with his bright orange hair he’s pretty much a beacon anyway), “so. Um. If you want, you could stay over and go home in the morning.”

He knows Hinata’s just about to call him an idiot, point out the sun still hanging in the sky, and pedal off before Kageyama can retaliate.

Hinata hasn’t changed much since high school, but he _has_ changed. Kageyama has a comprehensive mental list of _how_ he’s changed, and now he adds that university-student Hinata, instead of laughing and calling him an idiot, just gets a tiny smile on his face as he looks at Kageyama. “Sure,” he says easily. “Thanks, Kageyama.” He slides back off his bicycle and turns back toward Kageyama’s house, and doesn’t say another word about it.

Kageyama doesn’t remember that he’s only got one bed until they reach his house.

Living by himself, and all, he doesn’t really need more than one mattress. _Shit._ Hinata’s already locking his bike to Kageyama’s tree (which is sort of droopy-looking), and he’s dragged him all the way here, besides. It’ll be fine, probably. He can sleep on the couch.

Kageyama unlocks the door, and Hinata bounces in. If he notices that Kageyama doesn’t call “I’m home,” he doesn’t mention it, just slipping off his shoes and putting on his indoor ones. Kageyama clicks on the light (he’s learned from stubbed toes and whispered _ow_ s, this last semester, that Hinata’s night vision is terrible).

“Thanks,” Hinata says, yawning. He sniffs his arm suspiciously and wrinkles his nose. “Um, sorry, can I borrow your shower?”

“Don’t use all the hot water,” Kageyama says, pointing; Hinata laughs and flicks his nose before racing away. “Ow!”

_He won’t have anything to change into,_ so Kageyama collects an old shirt that’s too small on him anyway and an equally old, equally tiny pair of sweatpants. They’ll probably still be too big on Hinata, but they’re the smallest things he owns. A towel, next, and Kageyama leaves everything folded outside the bathroom door.

Hinata showers in record time; it hasn’t been five minutes when the water clicks off, and it’s two more before he’s dressed and out of the bathroom. “Thanks for the shirt.”

Kageyama looks up; the shirt’s hanging off him, but not that badly, and while the sweatpants are obviously tied as tightly as Hinata could manage, they’re at least not falling off. It’s easy to forget that Hinata, as short as he is, actually isn’t _that_ much shorter than Kageyama, especially after his growth spurt. He only looks small on the court because, well, volleyball tends to attract people who are _unreasonably_ tall. Hell, even _Kageyama_ occasionally feels short (especially when they’re up against Dateko. Or Tsukishima, who Kageyama is convinced has made a deal with the devil; he’s closer to 200cm than 190 now).

He just grunts in acknowledgment and grabs his own set of pajamas, heading for the bathroom. Hinata’s carefully folded the towel and put it back on the rack, just like he does in their dorm, and Kageyama makes a mental note to throw it in the laundry later. He showers quickly (faster than Hinata, _so there_ ) and dresses and comes out to find Hinata half-asleep against the wall.

“Oi, dumbass, wake up,” Kageyama says, flicking his nose as revenge for earlier. “Time for bed.”

“I’m not tired,” Hinata protests, looking at him through half-open eyes. “’M just…”

Kageyama rolls his eyes. “Come on.” He pulls Hinata to his feet and leads him to the one bedroom in the house. “You’re sleeping here. I’m taking the couch.”

“Isn’t this your bed?” Hinata asks, taking in the mess of schoolwork (most of it’s from high school; Kageyama maybe should clean) and clothes scattered on the floor.

“I’ve only got one bed,” Kageyama says shortly. “You’re the guest, so you get it.”

“Don’t be dumb,” Hinata says, rolling his eyes. Kageyama’s still trying to figure out what he means when Hinata shoves him, hard, so he falls face-first onto the bed.

“Hey!” Kageyama protests; Hinata ignores him and climbs in next to him, stealing one of Kageyama’s thousand pillows and burrowing under the covers.

“Your bed is ginormous,” Hinata informs him. “I’m pretty sure we could fit the _entire team_ on this thing."

Well. Since he’s here, and also because his couch is actually incredibly uncomfortable and he hates sleeping on it.

And maybe a little bit because he missed sleeping next to his spiker.

 

Hours later, Kageyama wakes out of _yet another_ nightmare (the's so thoroughly _sick_ of bad dreams) to discover that he’s gotten wrapped around Hinata again, as usual, but Hinata’s not asleep; he can tell from the way he’s breathing. Hinata sounds like a tiny cat motor when he’s asleep. He snores, but they’re small snores (Kageyama once made the mistake of asking if his snores are so little because he is and got a pillow thrown at him for his trouble).

Even without the snoring, though, he’d still be able to tell. Hinata’s combing his fingers through Kageyama’s hair and making soft little _shh_ noises and actually _singing._ It’s something Kageyama vaguely recognizes as a lullaby, but he doesn’t have time to figure out the exact song, because Hinata stops as soon as he realizes Kageyama’s awake.

“Go back to sleep,” he whispers, dropping his hand and blinking up at Kageyama with his stupidly wide brown eyes that always reflect even the _tiniest_ bit of light.

“Were you singing?” Kageyama asks, twisting his chin up to look at Hinata (who always somehow ends up scrunched above Kageyama, his chin near Kageyama’s head somewhere).

Hinata gives a tiny cough. “It’s, um, something I used to do for Natsu. When she was really little. She was scared of the dark, so she slept in my room a lot.”

He’s using the same nightmare tactic he uses on his _baby sister_ on Kageyama?

“I didn’t wanna wake you up,” Hinata says, blinking at him again. “Sorry. Go back to sleep.”

“Did I wake you up?” It’s still dark outside, because his room is still dark, and he knows from experience that Hinata will sleep until someone forces him to get up (well, except when there’s volleyball involved, and even then it’s dicey).

“S’okay,” Hinata says, and promptly ruins it with a huge yawn. “‘M used to you talking in your sleep, stupid.”

“At least I don’t _kick_ in my sleep,” Kageyama retorts. “Or try to play volleyball.” His face is still sore from the time Hinata had thought his head was a volleyball and tried to sleep-spike it. (He swears that it won him a point in his dream.)

He can see Hinata turn scarlet, even in the dark. “Shut up and go to sleep.”

“I’m awake now,” Kageyama says, poking the nearest available part of his fluffy orange head.

“Hey, Kageyama?” Hinata twists to get a better look at him. “How come you aren’t at a good school?”

_“Huh?”_ Even for Hinata (who doesn’t have a train of thought so much as a bunny that hops around from track to track), that’s an abrupt change of subject.

“It’s not like our school’s really known for volleyball,” Hinata says. “That’s why I picked it, actually, because you’re all amazing and I didn’t expect any of you to be there. And you _promised_ me you were going to go to nationals and internationals and win them all.”

“Things change.” _Scouts don’t look at schools who don’t make it through prefecturals._ Third year, sure, they’d gotten to Nationals, knocked out in their second match, but still that wasn’t enough to impress any scouts. “You told me, first year, you were going to stay at the same level as me.” He doesn’t mean that to come out quite as accusatory as it does (for once), and feels Hinata go perfectly still.

“So what,” Hinata says after a moment of awkward silence, “you’re telling me that just because _I_ broke my leg _you_ couldn’t keep playing?” ‘Hinata now understands and uses sarcasm’ is one of the more annoying items on Kageyama’s list. “You don’t need me to win.”

“You were always the only one who could keep up with my tosses,” Kageyama says. “There’s no point if you aren’t there.”

“What if you’d found someone else who could hit your toss, though?” Hinata asks; his tone is casual enough, but Kageyama feels his arms tighten. “I can’t be the only one.”

Kageyama tilts his head down. “You really _are_ a dumbass.”

“Hey!” Hinata looks up at him, scowling. “Don’t be mean! I’m serious! Inuoka probably could if he wanted to…”

“Look,” Kageyama says, flicking Hinata’s nose (“ow, Kageyama!”). “I don’t care if there’s someone else who can hit my toss out there somewhere. I don’t want to set it to anyone else. Got it?”

Hinata’s nose crinkles, and then he grins and flicks Kageyama’s nose back. “I love you too,” he says, yawning. His tone’s half-joking, but Kageyama blinks down at him anyway.

“Huh?”

“Suga-san says that’s how you tell people you care about them,” Hinata says, stifling a yawn in Kageyama’s shirt.

“Suga-san,” Kageyama says, “should keep out of other people’s business.” Their former vice-captain is _nosy._

“So you _don’t_ care about me?” Hinata asks, and there’s a definite teasing note in his voice now.

“I didn’t say that,” Kageyama mutters. Hinata stays quiet, letting him talk. “I said I don’t want to set our toss to anyone else. Just you. And I want to kick Oikawa-san’s ass with you next semester, and all our other old opponents, and go to Nationals again and replace Ushijima on Japan’s national team.”

“Wouldn’t you have to replace a setter?” Hinata asks, flattening down his hair (one hand wiggles free from around Kageyama’s waist, and he feels the tickle as the fluffy hair shifts) and deepening his voice in a _terrible_ imitation of Kageyama. “ _I’m a setter! I can’t play any other position because I’m super boring, bluh bluh bluh.”_

“Hinata, I’m going to _kill_ you and hide the body.” Hinata just laughs. “Fine. You replace Ushijima, and I’ll replace the setter.”

“Good plan,” Hinata murmurs. “It’s a date.”

Kageyama waits for Hinata’s breathing to even out, and the little cat snores to start up again, before he responds.

“Yeah, it’s a date.”

“Knew it,” Hinata whispers. (Okay, so maybe he _has_ learned to fake the snoring.)

“Go to sleep, you idiot.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaaaand...that's a wrap.  
> I'm trying to find words to express properly how much I appreciate the incredible response this fic has gotten, and I think maybe I should just find a gif of Hinata going GWAHHH, because that's pretty much me. This is, by a /really/ wide margin, the longest thing I've ever written, and it's been really rewarding to write and post. So, one more time: Thanks for reading!! :D You guys are seriously amazing and I love all of you and aaaaa. I'll be back whenever I can steal some free time between classes!


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